Itsu
by I-Heart-Hatake-Kakashi
Summary: A mysterious woman brings Sasuke back to Konoha. Just how is she connected to the village? Ch 24: And they lived Happily Ever After... THE END. If you can't say anything nice, please don't say anything at all... read something else. thanks
1. Sasuke's Return

**Disclaimer**: I don't own Naruto

**Chapter summary**: This is my second OC story (though I wrote this chapter before I ever even thought up the _Soraoi_ story), the main character is my original character: Itsu… I wasn't going to start posting this story until I finished _Soraoi_, but I decided to post the first chapter as a birthday gift to myself… Happy birthday me… lol… Anyway, This first chapter is about Sasuke's return. I hope you like it…

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A cloaked figure quickly leapt through the trees, hoping desperately to make it in time to the village buried deep in the unconscious boy's mind. They had been running for two days now, and the boy's condition had not improved. Meanwhile, the other was beginning to grow increasingly tried and weak from hunger.

The young boy had been injured in battle; thankfully the other was well trained in medical jutsu, and was thus able to stabilize the boy for the time being. The talented medic-nin was also skilled in genjutsu, and had peered into the mind of the boy, finding the name of a hidden village, and faces of friends and family. It was a place the medic-nin knew, and recognizable faces; but a place long since forgotten by the tired ninja.

The two lone figures raced through the trees nearing the village gates.

_Will I make it?_ The exhausted ninja wondered, _I'm reaching the limit of my chakra._

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::elsewhere in the same forest:::

Returning from another successful mission, four figures rapidly raced through the trees outside of Konoha.

"WHAT A WONDERFUL DISPLAY OF YOUTHFULNESS." shouted an overly enthusiastic jonin clad in green spandex.

His three former students, turned teammates followed behind their smiling leader, two of them wishing desperately to make it out of the forest and into the village to get away for their insane sensei, and his equally overly enthusiastic mini-me.

"We're almost near the village!" Tenten exclaimed.

"Hn" replied Neji, though on the inside he was very glad to be getting home after such a long mission. It's not that he didn't like his teammates, on the contrary, he considered them his closest and dearest friends, but spending two weeks with Gai and Lee was just too much for even the great Hyuga prodigy to handle.

Without warning, Neji abruptly stopped in his tracks. Tenten was the first to notice, having been right behind him the whole time. Lee and Gai quickly noticed their two comrades were no longer following.

"What is it?" asked Gai, directing his questions towards the Hyuga "Do you see something?"

"Hai!" Neji replied. He signaled towards an area in the forest no more than 100 yards to the southeast of them.

The three shinobi and kunoichi quietly surrounded the mysterious figures lying on the forest floor. They didn't look dangerous in their current condition, but it was always wise to approach unknown characters with caution.

A surprised gasp escaped Tenten's lips, as Neji and Gai flipped the two figures over.

"Sasuke-kun" Lee uncharacteristically whispered in shock.

"I can't believe this." Tenten added, in awe. "All this time, we've been searching for him, and he shows up here out of the blue?"

"I don't understand." A confused Lee stated.

"Hn." Neji replied, equally as confused as his two teammates.

Why had Sasuke returned? And who was this woman that had apparently been carrying him this far? So many questions floated in Neji's head, however there was no time for that. Even without his Byakugan activated, Neji could tell that the two needed to get to a hospital, and fast. The Uchiha's normally fair completion was paler than Neji remembered.

"They need medical attention." Tenten said, reading Neji's mind.

"Hn." Neji agreed.

"She looks familiar…" Gai finally spoke; his words attracting the attention of his three younger comrades.

"WHO IS SHE GAI-SENSEI?" asked Lee, regaining his youthful enthusiasm once more.

"I… do not know." replied Gai.

_Figures,_ thought Tenten,_ he's horrible with faces. She could just as easily be his sister and he wouldn't remember. Then again, she's much too pretty to be Gai-sensei's sister._

Tenten quickly looked the young woman over. She looked to be taller than the average female, though not freakishly so. Tenten figured the woman was probably around Yuhi Kurenai's height, maybe taller. Her face was a creaming ivory, though in her currently condition it appeared sickly pale. Her hair was messily tied up and mostly hidden beneath the hood of her cloak, but Tenten could spot dirty silver strands peeking out from under the cloak. For a moment, she thought the woman was older, but upon seeing her smooth young face, Tenten calculated her age at about early twenties.

"We should get them to the village immediately." Gai-sensei decided, quickly picking up Sasuke as Neji picked up the woman.

Quickly, the four made their way to the village, splitting up upon arrival, as Neji and Gai took the two they had found to Konoha Hospital and Tenten went to report to the Hokage. Meanwhile, Lee took it upon himself to inform all of Konoha of Sasuke's return, against protests from the rest of his team. They tried to convince Lee that it might not be a good idea to tell anyone until the hokage decided it so. However, there was no stopping Lee, he felt it in his heart that at least Naruto, Sakura and Kakashi should know, as well as Kiba, Shikamaru, and Choji, who had been part of the first group to try and bring Sasuke back.

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A/N: I know; it's kind of VERY short, but I just wanted to get the first chapter down. There will be a second one soon enough.


	2. Konoha Hospital

**Disclaimer**: I don't own Naruto

**Chapter summary**: At Konoha hospital.

**Thanks for the reviews**: babygurl1012 (glad to see you moved onto this story after Soraoi) and Deefa.

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A large group assembled nervously in the wide corridor, just outside of the operating room, in Konoha hospital. Among them, a blue eyed blond was frantically pacing back and forth.

"Why is this taking so long?!" Naruto impatiently screamed.

"Keep it down baka, we're in a hospital." Kiba shouted.

"You're being just as loud as I am!" Naruto yelled back.

"Both of you are being too loud." Shikamaru muttered, as he leaned back onto the wall behind him. Beside him, Choji opened a fresh bag of potato chips, while Ino continued to stare at the "treatment in progress" light that hung over the entrance to the Emergency room where Tsunade and Shizune were treating Sasuke.

"I just can't believe Sasuke is really back." Naruto exclaimed, stopping to look once more at the double doors, in hopes that someone would walk out to inform, the twelve waiting outside in the spacious hall, what his condition was.

"Yeah" Choji munched nervously on his chips, "after all that time we spent searching…"

"And someone practically hand delivers him to us." Ino finished for him.

"Who is this person, anyway?" Naruto asked, resuming his pacing back and forth.

"A woman." Neji replied, leaning against the opposite wall from Shikamaru, Ino, Choji, Kiba and Shino.

"But we don't know who she is." Tenten added, from beside Neji.

"THAT'S NOT TRUE!" Lee shouted, before Tenten covered his mouth and told him to be quiet, "Gai-sensei knows who she is!" he added, in a quieter voice, though still a bit loud by most people's standards.

"Is that so?" Kakashi pulled his head out of his book to look at Gai.

"Yes, I do believe I know her." Gai said, scratching his head as he thought.

"Well…?" Kurenai asked, as everyone's attention turned towards Gai.

"I… can't remember." Gai told them.

"Figures." Kakashi mumbled, before returning his attention back to his book.

Gai was known to be horrible with faces, no matter how memorable the face might be, he was hopeless when it came to remembering (A/N: think Kisame, shippuuden 12).

"What's she like?" Naruto asked. He was very curious as to who the woman that had brought back his friend was.

"Well…" Tenten cupped her chin, trying to remember, "She's very pretty. She's tall, thin, has pale skin, and long silver hair."

"Silver hair, does that mean she's old?" Choji asked, between mouthfuls of chips.

"That's what I thought too." Tenten replied, not noticing the amused looks on Kurenai and Asuma, as they looked over at their friend, who was too busy reading to care. "But then I realized she's actually pretty young, maybe early to mid-twenties." She guessed.

"What else can you tell us about her?" Ino asked, now very curious as to who this woman could be.

"Well, not much more. She was unconscious at the time that we found them." Tenten replied.

"We'll know more soon enough." Asuma finally spoke.

"That's right; Hinata-chan and Sakura-chan are with her right now." Kurenai added.

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"Ano… Sakura-chan?" Hinata quietly sought to attract the attention of the pink haired medic-nin.

"Yes Hinata?" Sakura turned to face the Hyuga heiress, who was holding the patient's chart.

"She's awake." Hinata pointed towards the woman, who was indeed awake, watching the two young kunoichi exam her vitals on the surrounding machines.

"Oh good, you're conscious." Sakura turned towards the woman. "Do you know where you are?" Sakura asked, as was routine for anyone who had suffered a blow to the head.

"..." The woman merely shook her head in response.

"Um..." Hinata interrupted. "There are some questions we need to ask." She began, looking down at the chart in her hands. "Name?"

"…" the woman remained silent.

"Sorry, but we need you name." Hinata insisted.

"…" still, the woman said nothing.

"Um… you do remember your name… right?" Hinata asked, remembering that the woman had suffered from a concussion.

"No…" the woman whispered, almost inaudibly. There was sadness in her voice that hinted at something, but what, the girls could not grasp.

"Nani?..." Sakura shouted "We didn't realize the blow to your head had been **that** severe." Turning to address Hinata, "inform Tsunade-sama or Shizune. This could be more serious then we previously believed." Sakura instructed.

"Hai." The blue haired girl exited the room quickly, making her way towards the operating room.

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"Ahhh!" Naruto yelled.

"Patience, Naruto." Kakashi said from behind his book.

"I can't wait any longer!" Naruto said frustrated, before throwing himself down on the floor to sit.

"Well, you're going to have to Naruto." Ino replied, though she had to admit, she was just as anxious as Naruto was to see Sasuke.

Ino had been lucky that it was her day off from the hospital, unlike Sakura, so she had been able to wait with everyone else. Although, after hours of waiting, she almost wished she **had** been on duty; even if she would not have been allowed to be in the room with Sasuke, she would at least have been kept busy, and not anxiously awaiting for the red "treatment in progress" light to turn off.

"Hinata." Kiba noticed his teammate rushing over to where the twelve of them were gathered, and began walking over to her.

"Kiba-kun." Hinata abruptly stopped before her teammate. "Is Tsunade-sama still in there?" she asked, pointing towards the operating room.

"Hai." Kiba walked her over to join the rest of the group. "They're been at it for hours." He added.

"Oh." Hinata wondered whether to wait, or to try and find someone else who could help her.

"Is something wrong?" Shino walked over to where his two teammates stood. He was always very good at sensing when Hinata had something to say, but felt unable to bring herself to say.

"I was sent to find Tsunade-sama or Shizune-san" Hinata explained, "the woman who brought Sasuke-kun is awake."

"She is?!?!" Naruto exclaimed.

"Hai." Hinata nodded her head.

"We have to talk to her." Naruto stood up from the floor. _Finally_, he thought, _we'll be able to find out what happened to Sasuke_.

"Ano… Naruto-kun." Hinata called out to him before he could leave.

"What it is, Hinata-chan?" He asked, getting ready to take off.

"I don't think she'll be able to tell you anything." Hinata said, guessing at why Naruto was so eager to see the woman.

"Why not, Hinata?" Kurenai asked her shy student.

"She appears to be suffering from amnesia; possibly due to the concussion we treated her for." Hinata quietly responded.

"Amnesia?" Kurenai repeated.

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"You remember nothing of what happened before today?' Sakura asked the woman seated in the bed, as she shone the small flashlight to check the woman's eyes. (A/N: no idea why doctor's do that, but they do… lol).

"I never said that." The woman replied. Sakura stopped what she was doing, and looked into the woman's eyes, a serious expression on her face.

"But, you just said you didn't remember your name." Sakura stated.

"I did." The woman confirmed what Sakura had said.

"Then…?" Sakura was at a lost for words; unable to understand what the woman was saying.

"…" the woman remained silent for a moment. She glanced through the room, before turning back to face Sakura, "Where are my clothes?" she asked.

"Answer my question first." Sakura stood her ground, "what's your name?"

"I already told you what you need to know." The woman replied.

"You're telling me that you didn't lose your memory from the concussion, but you don't remember your name, is that right?" Sakura summarized everything down.

"It is." The woman confirmed. "Now, where are my clothes?" she asked again.

"How is that possible?" Sakura ignored the woman's question.

The woman sighed, realizing that the young kunoichi would not be giving up any time soon, "I have no name." the woman finally said.

"No name?" Sakura repeated, "That's impossible; everyone has a name."

"I.have.no.name." the woman repeated.

"Everyone has a name." Sakura insisted.

Growing frustrated with the pink haired medic, the woman began rising from the bed.

"What are you doing?" Sakura tried to gently push the woman back down.

"I've answered your question, now answer mine." The woman replied, "Where are my clothes?"

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**A/N: **I know, not that it's not very action packed or anything, but like I said in my summary, this story will be long, and the first few chapters will be mostly about character development. And generally, I end each chapter where it feels right, or around 1000 to 2000 or so words… that way I can post more chapters, faster; but of course if I can get a long chapter out in one day, then I will…


	3. Itsu

**Disclaimer**: I don't own Naruto

**Chapter summary**: Itsu

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"Wait! You can't leave yet." Sakura yelled out, chasing after the fleeing woman, through the halls of Konoha hospital.

"I told you, if you won't tell me where my clothes are, I'll find them myself." The woman called back, as she turned another corner.

"You can't go that way, that's a dead end." Sakura called out.

Ignoring Sakura's warnings, she continued heading in that direction. When Sakura arrived at the dead end, she was surprised to find it empty. Sakura was startled by the woman's swiftnes, especially in the condition she found herself.

"Where did she go?" Sakura asked herself; scanning the area for any possible escape routes.

Sakura decided to head over to where everyone was waiting to hear about Sasuke, hoping to hear something herself, or at the very least recruit some of her friends to help find the escaped woman.

"Sakura-chan!" came the familiar voice of Naruto, as Sakura approached the large group.

"Hi, everyone. Is there any news?" Sakura asked.

"Not yet." Ino answered her.

"Oh." Sakura said a little disappointed. It seemed like this whole thing was taking forever. "Hinata." She called the petite girl.

"Yes?" Hinata turned to her friend.

"You haven't talked to Tsunade-sama yet, right?" Sakura asked, hopeful that the young Hyuga hadn't, considering the new information.

"No, sorry." Hinata apologized.

"No need to be sorry," Sakura assured her, "in fact, that's good."

"Why is that good?" Neji inquired, a little annoyed that his cousin was still such a push over, but grateful that the pink-hair medic-nin had replied as she had.

"Well," Sakura began, "I kind of lost the patient." Sakura confessed.

"NANI?!" Naruto jumped up from his seat on the floor. "You killed her?"

"What?!" Sakura shouted back, "Why would you think that, baka?" she bonked the blond on the head.

"You said you lost her." Naruto retorted, rubbing the stop on his head where Sakura hit him, "Hinata-chan told us she was fine, just couldn't remember anything, which mean YOU had to do something."

"I didn't mean she's dead, baka!" Sakura scolded him, "I meant… I LITERALLY lost her. She ran away!"

"Ran away?" Kurenai repeated (A/N: I have her do that a lot don't 1? Like a parrot… lol)

"Hai!" Sakura blushed a little. It was embarrassing to admit that a skilled kunoichi, such as herself, had allowed a patient to escape her custody.

"How?" Tenten asked, "Last time we saw her, she looked like she'd be out of it for at least a week."

It was true; when Team Gai had found the woman, she had been all but broken. Her chakra had been completely depleted, and she had suffered a number of injuries, including one to the head.

"Well, she must be a really quick healer, I guess." Sakura shrugged, it was the only logical explanation. She too had seen the condition of the woman when they brought her in, and had been surprised she had woken up so soon, let alone that was able to move and run.

"Apparently." Neji commented.

"Hey!" Tenten called out, garnering everyone's attention, "It's that her?" She pointed towards a thin figure wearing a hospital gown, a few yards from where they stood.

"It is!" Sakura excited exclaimed. "No one make a move… she's fast." She said, as she began circling around to try and grab her. Neji, Tenten, Kiba, Naruto and Lee volunteered to try and capture her. The six of them were about to split up; each going down different corridors to block any possible exits when suddenly Gai realized something.

"ITSU!" Gai exclaimed, startling everyone and causing them to lose sight of the woman.

The jonin sensei's gathered there, all looked up in surprise at Gai; Kakashi no longer reading his book, which he had let drop to the ground when he heard Gai.

"What.did.you.say?" Kakashi asked, visibly tense.

"That woman." Gai explained, "She looked just like Itsu, only, a little older."

"That's impossible." Kurenai exclaimed, "Itsu's been-" She stopped her self, "Itsu's been gone, for a very long time." She finished.

"But I know-" Gai began.

"Gai!" Asuma and Kurenai scolded him in unison, trying to silence him.

"It's okay." Kakashi assured them, "Tell me Gai." He turned to face his friend, "Are you sure?"

"I WOULD NEVER LIE TO YOU, MY ETERNAL RIVAL!" Gai replied, "And…" he began in a more serious tone, "I would never say anything false about her."

"Where is she?" Kakashi turned to Neji, who had his byakugan activated, and was searching for the woman in question.

"Three halls down and to the left, but she's moving fast." Neji informed him.

"Everyone split up… Shikamaru, go with Neji, Ino, with Hinata. You four are the most likely ones to find her because of the Byakugan, so Shikamaru and Ino, if you find her, use your jutsu to get a hold of her. Naruto, use your shadow clones to search through the hospital. Lee and Gai, to the main exit, block her if she tries to leave. Choji, to the elevators, block them. Kiba and Shino, to the stairs. Sakura, inform the hospital staff that a patient is on the loose.. Asuma and Kurenai, emergency exits." Kakashi motioned for them to split, and everyone went in their assigned directions.

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"Kaka-sensei" Kakashi turned to face Sakura who was standing a few feet behind him.

"What is it, Sakura?" He asked.

"They found her. Shikamaru used his Shadow possession jutsu on her, and they're taking her back to her room." The two began walking towards the hospital room where the woman was assigned to.

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"Kami-sama!" Kurenai gasped as she and Asuma walking into the room where the younger shinobi were already gathered.

"Is it really her?" Asuma rubbed his eyes in disbelief.

"Who is she?" Naruto asked, watching as Hinata gave the woman a sedative to calm her down, while Shikamaru continued to hold her down with his jutsu.

"Hatake Itsu." Gai said, in a solemn tone.

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**A/N:** dun dun dun… lol… gotta wait til the next chapter… beddy-bye time for me now…

Now we're finally getting to the good stuff…


	4. Jiraiya

**Disclaimer**: I don't own Naruto

**Chapter summary**: Hatake Itsu, who is she? How is she related to Kakashi? And what does Jiraiya have to do with her. This chapter builds the character of Itsu.

**Setting: **some point after the time skip. Everyone's a Chunin (including Naruto at this point), except (of course) Neji, who's a jonin already.

**Thanks for the reviews**: babygurl1012 and lady.0f.lorien

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"Hatake?" Naruto questioned.

He looked down at the woman, who was now unconscious, thanks to the sedatives that Hinata had injected her with. He had to admit, she was pretty. She had delicate feminine features, a soft jaw line, and high cheekbones, a small nose, and big eyes; but the thing that stood out the most about her, was her long shiny silver hair.

"Does that mean she's Kaka-sensei's sister?" Naruto asked no one in particular, but it seemed the most logical explanation.

"No." was Asuma's short reply.

"Then what?" Naruto demanded.

"His wife." Gai finally answered.

"WIFE?!" Naruto, Ino, Kiba, Lee, and Tenten all exclaimed in unison. Neji, Hinata, Choji, and Shino were just as surprised as their louder counterparts, but being who they were, they didn't react as shocked. (A/N: Choji was busy eating, so he couldn't yell… oh and Shikamaru already figured it out before hand… he's just that smart; and of course the senseis already knew, and Sakura is out in the halls with Kakashi).

"That's right," Kurenai said, "but we thought she died five and a half years ago, when…" Kurenai stopped, realizing that Kakashi had arrived at the door, with Sakura right behind him.

Kakashi slowly approached the bed where the woman lay sleeping. He looked directly at her, scanning her full form up and down; wondering if it really was his wife. The woman who he had believed died years earlier, during her clan's massacre. He lifted his hand up to remove the forehead protector from his left eye. And he saw it; the truth.

"Itsu…" Kakashi fell to his knees before everyone; for the first time showing sincere emotion. (A/N: not that he's not sincere or emotional, but he usually plays it pretty cool, so…)

"You're sure?" Asuma asked his friend.

"Hai. It's her." Kakashi replied, his head bowed to hide the tears that were swelling in his eyes.

"Gai," Asuma turned to face the spandex wearing jonin.

"Yes." Gai replied, knowing full well what Asuma was thinking, he turned to his students, "Lee. Neji." Both turned towards their former sensei. "Neji, help Lee find Jiraiya-sama, and bring him here immediately." He instructed.

"Kiba, Shino, Hinata; help them." Kurenai instructed her teammates.

With Neji and Hinata's eyes, Lee's speed, Kiba and Akamaru's noses, and Shino's bugs, it would be easy enough to find and bring back the perverted sage.

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Crouching behind the wooden panels of the woman's bathhouse, the great toad sage was conducting some 'research' for his next novel.

"YOSH!" Lee ran across the bride that covered the hot-spring waters; Neji, a short distance behind. (A/N: I love Neji, but let's face it, Lee's faster). "JIRAIYA-SAMA, GAI-SENSEI-" the boy in green shouted.

"Quiet down boy!" Jiraiya yelled back at the loud chunin. "You want to get us caught?"

"Sorry." Lee spoke a little more quietly, "Gai-sensei instructed us to find you." He informed the sannin.

"What does that lunatic want now?" Jiraiya asked, not bothering to look away from his peep-hole.

"GAI-SENSEI IS NOT-" Lee began to defend his idol.

"Itsu." Neji interrupted his youth obsessed teammate, before he got too carried away.

"Itsu?" this got Jiraiya's attention. The perverted hermit turned to face the younger shinobi. "What about her?" he asked, all emotion drained from his voice.

"She's alive." Neji informed, realizing, from the sannin's reaction, that this information would be important to the man.

"Where?" Jiraiya rose from his crouching position, preparing himself for their instruction.

"Konoha Hospital." Before Neji had even finished, Jiraiya used flash step to quickly rush toward the hospital, leaving the two other shinobi far behind.

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"Tsunade-sama." Shizune reentered the operating room, where she and Tsunade had just finished healing Sasuke, who was now restfully sleeping in the metal table at the center of the room.

"What is it, Shizune?" Tsunade asked the nervous looking woman.

"They're all gone." Shizune replied.

"What do you mean 'they're all gone'?" Tsunade was taken back by this news; all day, the 12 ninja's had waiting patiently outside the OR in the hall, _Why would they leave so suddenly? _She asked herself. "Take Sasuke to the same room as the woman who brought him in and then help me find them. They'll want to know how the boy is doing." She instructed her apprentice.

"Hai!" Shizune walked over to Sasuke's side and lifted the boy up with the help of two medic nin, and placed him on a stretcher to carry him to his room.

"I wonder what could have happened." Tsunade asked herself, as she walked out into the hallway, and confirming that in fact, it **was** empty.

"TSUNADE!" a loud voice boomed out to the hokage. She looked over and saw none other than Jiraiya running anxiously towards her. With the number of hospital staff chasing after him, it was clear he'd been running around the hospital for some time.

"Leave him be." Tsunade instructed his pursuers. "What are you up to Jiraiya?" she asked the white haired sannin.

"Itsu!" He said, somewhat out of breath, "Where is she?"

"Itsu?" Tsunade gave him a concerned look. "Are you okay, Jiraiya?" she was about to ask him if he were drunk, but reconsidered, believing it might be too insensitive, even for her.

"She's alive." He exclaimed, "Gai's students told me she was here."

"Here?" _that explains why everyone's missing, but…_ "Who…" Suddenly it dawned on her, "Follow me."

She began walking toward the room of the woman who had brought Sasuke in. Tsunade hadn't seen the woman herself, but was now certain that this had to be the same little silver haired girl she'd known all those many years ago. (A/N: I don't know if its all that necessary to clear up, but the reason she knows is obviously Gai or someone informed her that the woman had silver hair).

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"So this is where everyone went." Shizune murmured to herself, upon walking into the hospital room; behind her, two men in white coats were holding a stretcher carrying the sleeping Sasuke.

"Sasuke!" Naruto yelled out.

"Please, Naruto, this is a hospital." Shizune gestured for everyone to move aside, so the medic-nin could place Sasuke onto the second bed.

"How is he?" Sakura asked from behind Naruto.

"He's still recovering, but the majority of his injuries have been healed." Shizune replied.

A scream from outside the room caught everyone's attention.

"Jiraiya!" Tsunade yelled from the other side of the door. "Stop bothering the other patients! I already told you; room 302." No sooner had the hokage finished yelling, had the man in question come barging into the room.

"Is it…" Jiraiya began, before seeing the woman laying in the hospital bed and making his way over to Kakashi's side. "My little girl…"

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**A/N**: woah!... lol… did you see that one coming?... (Hello, other than Kakashi and Kabuto, who else has silver/gray hair in _Naruto_?... okay so it's more white then silver, but come on, he had that hair color since he was a genin, so obviously it's his natural shade… although, come to think of it, maybe it was a little more silver when he was younger, and now it's actually white because he's older…)

Anyway…. Oh, the surprises are still NOT over… Two more actually… one of them is hinted at in the last chapter, and another at the beginning of this one… brownie points if you can guess what they are before I post the next chapter… **:D**


	5. Houkou

**Disclaimer**: I don't own Naruto

**Chapter summary**: The one where we find out who Itsu REALLY is.

**Setting: **some point after the time skip. Everyone's a Chunin (including Naruto at this point), except (of course) Neji, who's a jonin already.

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"How is this possible?" Tsunade asked, as she walked into the room and looked down at the two emotionally exposed jonin. She looked at the down at the woman that had brought the two elite ninja's to their knees and instantly recognized her. It had been many years since the hokage had seen her, but without a doubt… it was Itsu.

"I always knew." Jiraiya softly spoke, looking down at his daughter. Kakashi questioningly looked at the man. "When I was searching for Orochimaru," he began explaining, "and he joined the Akatsuki… I knew that Itachi had only staged the massacre of his clan to steal away Itsu, without anyone noticing."

"Why would he want to do that?" Shizune asked inquisitively.

"Because she's a jinchūriki." Kakashi answered. (A/N: as if people didn't already know, but just in case, a jinchūriki is a person who has a tailed beast sealed within them).

"NANI!?" Naruto shouted, upon hearing this information. Everyone else appeared just as surprised.

"That's right." Jiraiya confirmed, "But unlike with Naruto, this was not common knowledge. Outside of the Uchiha clan, only a select few knew that Itsu had been sealed with a five-tailed wolf." (A/N: technically in the legend of the tailed demons, it's a dog, but I like wolf better… close enough).

"What are you saying, ero-sennin?" Naruto couldn't believe what he was hearing. He had known that many villages had tired to posses the power of the tailed-beasts, but why they had never before told him there had been another one in Konoha, he couldn't understand.

"As you all know," Jiraiya began, directing himself to everyone, though facing Naruto as he spoke, "There was a time when the five nations were at war for many years. During that time, each nation came up with the idea of sealing the tailed beasts to control their power. This proved to be very difficult, and many people died in the pursuit of achieving this goal." He sadly remembered the student who had perished in this way.

"The Uchiha's had special knowledge of the tailed beasts." Kakashi continued the story for Jiraiya. "They chose Itsu before she was even born, much like with Gaara-sama; her mother died as the sacrifice for the seal."

"If she was the daughter of one of the sannin, why did they choose her to be the vessel?" Shikamaru asked.

"Because there was a war; and people get desperate." Tsunade hurriedly interjected.

The truth was, the clan elder's had chosen Itsu as punishment to her mother for having conceived a child out of wedlock. At the time, no one knew the child was that of the legendary sannin, Jiraiya, who had been fighting in the war. Had they known, perhaps they would not have used the mother and daughter to those ends.

"But what do the Uchiha's have to do with her?" Tenten asked curiously.

"They're Itsu's clan." Tsunade informed.

"What?" this time it was Sakura who yelled out, "but-but the hair… and they eyes…"

"Well, the hair is obviously from her father." Tsunade explained, "As for the eyes. We assumed it had something to do with the Houkou's characteristics. Much like Naruto, who carries some resemblance to the bijuu he carries, Itsu had certain characteristics to the tailed beast she harbored." She referred to Itsu's color-changing violet eyes. "What I don't get, is if she's been alive all this time, why didn't she return to Konoha?" the hokage wondered. (A/N: the Houkou is the five tailed dog... in this case wolf. And a bijuu is obviously a general name for the beasts).

"I think we might be able to answer that." everyone turned toward Sakura, waiting for what she had to say. "Hinata?" Sakura gestured for the other girl to explain.

"W-well… When I asked what her name was," Hinata nervously played with her fingers, "She told us she didn't know it."

"We thought it was the concussion," Sakura added, "but when I asked if she remembered anything, she told me that she didn't lose her memory because of the blow to her head; her memory lose was from before this."

"Could that be why she's been gone all this time?" Asuma asked.

"It's possible." Tsunade thoughtfully replied. "If Jiraiya's right, and Itachi took her during the massacre… perhaps the trauma of witnessing her clan's murder might have caused her to block everything."

"Wait!" Naruto interrupted again. "If Itachi took her to the Akatsuki, how is she still alive?"

"She probably got away from him." Kurenai guessed.

"She was always very strong." Gai added, "Even when we were genin."

"She was definitely stronger than Itachi. She would have put up a fight, even if Itachi weren't acting alone at the time." Jiraiya said, with a hint of pride in his voice.

"So…What now?" Ino asked the question that was on everyone's mind.

"Right now, we're going to let these two rest." Tsunade ordered. "Then we'll see what they have to say, and if need be, we'll have ANBU use the Time reversal jutsu to help Itsu remember." She began pushing everyone out of the room

In the end, the only ones who remained were the two sleeping figures of Itsu and Sasuke, and Kakashi and Jiraiya, who refused to move from where they stood.

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"Tsunade-obaasan?" Naruto called out, after exiting the room. (A/N: obaasan means grandma).

"What is it Naruto?" Tsunade turned to face the boy.

"Could you tell me more about this person?" Naruto asked, referring to Itsu. Everyone else, also wanting to know, stopped in the hall to listen to what the Hokage might say.

"What do you want to know?" Tsunade asked, in a voice much softer than she was accustomed to using.

"Well, I know she's Kaka-sensei's wife, and ero-sennin's daughter… and she's an Uchiha… and I know you said there was a war and people get desperate, but… why would they… she was their family…" Naruto said, in a broken voice.

Naruto had come to understand that he had been chosen to carry the Kyuubi because he had no family, and so no one had protested, but this girl had a huge clan; and what's more, her father was on of the most famous shinobi in the village's history. Naruto just couldn't understand why her own family would do that to her. (A/N: of course we all know Naruto did have a dad, but he doesn't know that…)

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**A/N:**well, did anyone guess?... lets recap… (again)**Itsu is**** Kakashi's wife**(I'll get into how they met in a later chapter, but I'm sure you can all guess… still I'll have a nice flashback)… **Jiraiya's daughter** (albeit illegitimate)… **an ****Uchiha**(on her mother's side)… **and a ****jinchūriki** (the five tailed wolf: **Houkou**)… Oh I realize the "lost Uchiha" story has been played out to bits, and the "second Konoha tailed beast" plot has been pounded to the ground numerous times (though to be perfectly honest I haven't read any of them, only seen the numerous listings as I looked for stuff I wanted to read… for all I know there might be some good ones out there, so I won't say anything bad about them), but I'd like to think this story is a little different.

I like to keep the story line as close to the real plot as possible (up to shippuuden that is, because beyond that… I don't really like Sai and Yamato… and then Asuma dieing, not something I want to get to yet…), but… if I change a few things here and there, please forgive me; they're either an oversight on my part, or I needed them to make this story work. Anywho…

Please (this is the first time in all my 5 stories I've asked)… PLEASE review… one thing though, if you have nothing nice or constructive to say, then keep your opinions to yourself, I work really hard to make my stories flow and sound good (at least to me; if you don't like them, you don't have to read them.


	6. Awake

**Disclaimer**: I don't own Naruto

**Chapter summary**: Itsu wakes up.

**Setting: **some point after the time skip. Everyone's a Chunin (including Naruto at this point), except (of course) Neji, who's a jonin already.

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(Itsu's POV… sort of)

The bright florescent lights bouncing off the blindingly white walls stung Itsu's eyes as she opened them to face the ceiling above her. She felt stiff and groggy and instantly realized she'd been drugged. _No doubt that pink hair kunoichi_ she thought, somewhat bitterly as she tried to blink herself into a semi-lucid state.

She quickly scanned the room and realized she was not alone. There was a man, sitting in a chair next to her, sleeping with his head on her bed. Another man was leaning against the far wall next to the window, surprisingly asleep, even though he was standing up. She looked over to the only other bed in the room and recognized the boy she'd fought, mistakenly believing he was someone else. Someone from a past she no longer remembered.

"You're up." The man leaning onto her bed said, before rising to sit up properly in his seat.

"Who are you?" she asked.

"So it's true." He replied, somewhat disappointedly.

"What is?" she asked, wondering why his face, _or what little I can see of it_ she thought, appeared to denote a odd mixture of sadness, joy, and confusion.

"You really don't remember anything," he repeated, "do you Itsu?"

"Itsu?" the name sounded strangely familiar, but it seemed odd and out of place coming from the man before her. Perhaps it was his tone, or perhaps something more.

"That's you name." he informed her.

"And yours?" she asked, still somewhat dazed; partly from the sedative still making its way through her system, but also because it all seemed so strange.

She'd been searching for her past for so many years, always turning up dead ends, until eventually she had given up all hope of ever finding it; and yet, here was this man, dressed entirely in black with a green vest and mask covering most of his face, who claimed to know her, and had even given her a name… the one thing that she'd longed for, for many nights.

"Kakashi. Hatake Kakashi." He replied.

"And how is it you know me, Hatake Kakashi?" she asked him.

Though she could still felt a slight sliver of doubt in her mind that this could actually be true, a small voice in her heart told her that this man was worth trusting.

"We have a long history together." He replied.

"That's not at all vague." She sarcastically said.

"Tsunade-sama told us not to rush you," he explained, "she said it's best you remember on your own."

"It's been nearly six years…" she said in a drone tone, "I think we're way past 'rushing' it." She smirked at the masked man seated before her.

"I don't remember you being this sarcastic." The tall, broad shouldered man in the corner commented. He opened his eyes and began walking over toward the other two. "How are you feeling?" he asked.

"A little tired, and sore, but otherwise okay." Itsu replied, as she eyed the other man a bit suspiciously. "And you are?"

"Jiraiya, but you can call me Daddy." He replied, proudly puffing out his chest.

"I'd rather not." She replied. From what she could tell, she instantly pegged this older man as a pervert, and there was no way she'd be calling him 'daddy'.

"Actually." Kakashi interrupted her thoughts, "he is your father." He informed her.

"You sure?" she asked Kakashi, eyeing the older man, "He comes off a little perverted, if you ask me."

Kakashi chuckled at that, "Well, he is…"

"Kakashi!" Jiraiya quickly stepped behind the copy-nin to cover his mouth.

Itsu smiled at the grown men's antics. Somehow she felt like she really did know them. She'd long since given up searching for her past, having lost all hope of ever clearing the darkness that surrounded her memories. It wasn't until she'd run into the boy on the bed next to her, that some foggy memories began to spark in the deep recess of her mind.

He had looked familiar, and an overwhelming rage overtook her. Instantly, she had attacked the boy, who in turn defended himself. He'd been rather talented for his age, but nothing in comparison to herself. The anger she felt within was all consuming, that it took her a moment to realize that he wasn't who she had mistaken him for. She still didn't know who the boy was, or who the man she had mistaken him for was, but she did realize that it couldn't possible be the same person; not unless the man had not aged during the five or six years from the time since she had lost her memory.

When she realized the boy was not who she believed him to be, she had stopped her brutal attack on him, just moments before it might have been too late. She had immediately peered into his mind, using a jutsu she had mastered some time back, and saw the name of a hidden village. The images she saw in the boys mind triggered more soundless memories in her own clouded psyche, and she immediately knew what she had to do. She had to bring him back. And so she did; a small, secret part of her, hopeful that this was the opportunity she had longed for all those years ago.

"What's his name?" Itsu finally spoke up, ending the humorous struggle between the two grown men.

"Who? Sasuke?" Kakashi asked, gesturing toward the boy in the other bed.

"Sasuke." She repeated the name.

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**A/N**: okay, that's it for today… time for bed.

Oh… I received my first official flame today… lol… and I was (I suppose) in a bit of bitchy mood, so I replied back in the same manner that the reviewer flamed me… so… yeah… I just wanted to say, I love reviews, and encourage people to review (please and thank you)… but… if I get a flame, I've decided I'm not going to be nice about it… it's one thing to give constructive criticism… and I understand that sometimes it difficult to convey emotions over the impersonal internet, and occasionally we read our own emotions into other people's harmless messages, but I'm a very sensitive Cancer, and if someone is so obviously and purposefully malicious in their commentary, I won't hold back… I have sharp claws and a vast vocabulary and I will not hesitate to tear you a new one… (btw, that's not a challenge, just a fact).


	7. Remembering

**Disclaimer**: I don't own Naruto

**Chapter summary**: Some randomness, but it'll come into play later on.

**Setting: **some point after the time skip. Everyone's a Chunin (including Naruto at this point), except (of course) Neji, who's a jonin already.

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Seated at the Ichiraku, Naruto, Kiba, Shikamaru, and Choji were enjoying a peaceful meal of ramen.

"So have you heard anything about Sasuke?" Kiba asked Naruto.

It had been a few days since the Uchiha had woken up. Many of the villagers viewed the boy's return with mixed emotions. The Uchiha clan had always been revered and respected, but so much had happened that fear and suspicion had risen around the famous clan. Sasuke's disappearance had instilled a hatred for the clan, due to the fact that he betrayed the hidden leaf by joining up with the man who had once tried to destroy the village.

"They're still questioning him about Orochimaru." Naruto replied, momentarily putting his chopsticks down.

"Does that mean..." Choji paused from eating, "that the hokage is going to let him stay?"

"Of course she's going to let him stay!" Naruto exclaimed, "otherwise why would we have been looking for him for so long?"

"The sharingan." Shikamaru bluntly stated. "Though the Uchiha clan has all but disappeared, it's of vital importance that their blood-limit not reach enemy hands." He explained.

"And there are no worse enemy hands then Orochimaru's." Kiba added.

"Yeah, but he's dead now." Naruto said, "And Sasuke was the one who killed him." He pointed out.

"That doesn't mean he's loyal to Konoha." Shikamaru replied.

"How can you say that?" Naruto jumped out of his stool in outrage, "he's our friend!"

"He **was** _your_ friend." Shikamaru pointed out. "He's been away for a long time."

"People change." Choji agreed.

"Well I was away for a long time too." Naruto exclaimed.

"And you changed too." Kiba pointed out, "We all did."

"And that's different." Shikamaru added.

"WHY?" Naruto demanded.

"Because you didn't betray the village." Shikamaru replied before getting up and paying for his meal. The whole conversation was beginning to become much too troublesome for the lazy shinobi. "I'll see you around." He waved to the three others as he left to find a nice place to relax; maybe watch a few clouds.

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The interrogation room was dark, no doubt an intimidation strategy. But Sasuke had seen far worst during the years that he had been gone. He wouldn't be easily shaken by such trivial tactics.

"So you're telling us, a mere genin killed Orochimaru?" the ANBU with the hawk mask asked.

_Genin._ Sasuke smirked at the word. It was another tactic to try and intimidate him. But he'd long since out grown that rank. And yes, he had killed Orochimaru. He'd never had any intent on allowing that monster to have his body. He'd only been using him to attain power; power, so he could have his revenge.

"Answer the question, boy." The one with the dog mask ordered.

"I did." Sasuke replied through clenched teeth.

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"Has she been able to remember anything?" Jiraiya stood in front of the window, behind the Hokage's desk, as Tsunade shuffled through a pile of papers in front of her.

"Well, ANBU has been able to help her recover some of her earlier memories, but because of whatever trauma occurred, to cause her to lose her memory in the first place; she's having trouble remembering the more recent stuff." Tsunade replied.

"What do you mean?" Jiraiya turned to face the woman behind him.

"Well it seems that they were unable to use the Time reversal jutsu to go back to the moment before she lost her memory." Tsunade explained, "Usually, this technique is used to hypnotize the person to go backwards in their subconscious to retrieve the lost memories. Unfortunately, Itsu's mind won't allow us access to those last memories, so we've had to use the technique in a different way. Instead of working backwards, we're going back to her earliest memories, and working forwards."

"I see." Jiraiya slowly nodded his head as he contemplated this new information, "But you're confident that she'll eventually remember what happened, right?" he looked down to where Tsunade was seated at her desk.

"We can only hope." Tsunade replied, tapping her fingers nervously on her desk. "But I'm surprised she hasn't remembered anything in all the time she's been away."

"What do you mean?' Jiraiya furrowed his brows in question.

"Well, it's probably nothing." She reasoned, "But generally, with temporary memory lose, memories slowly begun to resurface after a while, and it's been nearly six years…" She trailed off upon seeing the concern on Jiraya's face. "But I'm sure it's nothing to be concerned about… she probably just needed to be around familiar faces to start remembering."

"…" Jiraiya merely stood there, thinking about what Tsunade had said.

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"So if we've been friends since our younger years, why is it you didn't remember me when you first picked me up in the forest?" Itsu asked the man in green spandex, standing before her.

"Well…" Gai scratched his head thoughtfully.

"Gai-sensei's not so good with faces." The younger kunoichi with twin buns in her hair replied for the older man.

"Besides, YOU didn't remember Gai-sensei either!" Lee came to the defense of his sensei.

"That's because she has amnesia, Lee." Neji chided Lee for his lack of common sense.

"Oh." Lee looked down disappointedly.

"So how did you and Gai-sensei meet?" Tenten asked Itsu.

She'd often wondered what her sensei had been like as a young boy. Perhaps he had been exactly like Lee, or maybe he's grown into the green spandex and bowl cut.

"We were in the same genin-cell." Itsu replied, having remembered that much at least.

"WHAT?!?" came the shouts of the three younger ninjas.

Lee shouted out of excitement of knowing someone who had been friends with his sensei that long, while Neji and Tenten shouted out of shock that even Gai could have forgotten someone he'd spent so much time with as a child. At first, they had believed Itsu was an acquaintance, but now, knowing they had been in the same cell, the two sane members of Team Gai were amazed at just how bad their sensei's memory for faces really was.

"That's right." Itsu continued, "Along with Shiranui Genma, the three of us formed team Ryoku." (A/N: Ryoku means strength… it's an OC, for right now lets assume he's already dead).

"SO WHAT WAS GAI-SENSEI LIKE WHEN HE WAS OUR AGE?" Lee regained his youthful enthusiasm, bouncing up and down as he asked Itsu his question.

"Well…" Itsu looked over at Gai, before turning back to face the younger version of her old friend. "He's pretty much the same was I remember him." She replied, much to the delight of Lee.

"Did he go around challenging Hatake Kakashi back then too?" Tenten wondered. She'd been curious for some time, how her sensei and the silver haired jonin began their infamous rivalry.

"Hatake Kakashi…" Itsu repeated, "Why does that name sound so familiar?" she wondered. "Oh, I know. That was the masked man I saw in the hospital." She recalled happily.

"YES! AND HE'S ALSO YO-" Lee began, before Gai rushed behind him to cover his mouth.

"What…?" Itsu looked questioningly at Gai.

"It's nothing." Gai assured her, as he removed his hand from covering Lee's mouth. "So you still haven't remembered Kakashi then?" he asked her.

"No. Should I?" Itsu asked.

"When the time is right." Gai replied, "For now, let's get started on that Taijutsu training you requested."

"Oh that's right." Itsu nodded, "I have to warn you though; taijutsu isn't really my strength."

"It never was." Gai chuckled at the memories.

**----------FLASHBACK----------**

"Ahhh!" an eleven year old Itsu flew across the forest after an attack from her apathetic teammate.

"Genma! Why would you use such force against our beautiful flower?" a thirteen year old Gai rushed over to the young girl's side. (1)

"We were sparring." Genma replied vaguely defensively, as his youth obsessed teammate helped the girl to her feet.

"That's right, Gai." Itsu smiled up reassuringly, "I'm fine. I just need a little more work."

**----------END OF FLASHBACK----------**

"Genjutsu was always more your area of expertise." Gai shook his head remembering the many times Itsu had landed on her butt while training with him and Genma.

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(1) I realize that teammates are usually the same age, but I've often wondered about this… if these, so called prodigies, are so advanced for their age, how come they didn't graduate the academy sooner (with the exception of Itachi whom we knew did, but then we don't know if he was the same age as his teammates were… and Kakashi graduated at 5, and became chunin at 6, so why were Obito and Rin the same age as him?.. just a thought). Also, I realize Genma is actually older than Gai, but let's just assume he's not…

oh, and I know… lame flashback… but it's 4am… can you blame me?... plus I really only wanted to do a small flashback to establish the age difference and small (very small) glimpse into the team dynamics…

**A/N: **sorry I haven't been able to update sooner. Some stuff came up, and I have to deal with that, so I might not be able to update as soon as I'd like. Still I really do want to continue and hopefully finish this story up before school starts up again in a few weeks. Anywho…

Um… I decided to take this opportunity to tell you all a little about where this character came from.

**Originally I just wanted to make a romantic interest for my favorite Naruto character (KAKASHI!), but I also wanted to really integrate her into the plot, and give her a thorough back-story, and I thought it'd be fun if she were a bijuu too… although I was a little wary of doing that, I've seen a lot of those plot-lines, but I thought, 'it's all in fun, why not?'. So I went online and looked up the story of the tailed beasts, and I found descriptions of all nine tailed beasts. After I eliminated Naruto, Gaara, and the three other tailed beasts already in the story line (2-tails, 3-tails, and 4-tail), I was left with the 5-tails, 6-tails, 7-tails and 8-tails. They're all pretty interesting, but the 5-tailed dog just got my attention. First, because Kakashi already has a connection to dogs and second because it's described as a white dog; and god of illusions (hello, genjutsu… lol)… and then when I thought white, white hair… I thought of Jiraiya. And I know that Kakashi and Jiraiya have a connection through the 4th, but I always thought their relationship seemed a little father/son-ish in a weird way; there's definitely a respect and friendship there, so I decided to incorporate Jiraiya into the story too… and possibly explain why Jiraiya is so good at training a Jinchūriki (Naruto) to use their demon's power (because he would have already had that experience, duh… :P). The Uchiha thing sort of just came up because, well we already saw that the Uchiha's had knowledge of the tailed beasts (as evident in episodes 75 and shippuuden 1), plus I needed a reason for her to have disappeared for so long, and with Itachi murdering his clan and then joining the Akatsuki (who are all about finding the tailed beasts anyway)… it kind of all just fell into place… Oh, and as for Gai and Genma being her teammates, well, Gai you'll realize why later (how Gai and Kakashi's rivalry began), and Genma, just because I think he's cool... lol…**


	8. Spring Time of Youth

**Disclaimer**: I don't own Naruto

**Chapter summary**: Itsu remembers Kakashi.

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"Just relax" the ANBU in the jackal mask told Itsu, as she sat in the middle of a bare gray room. He proceeded to form various hand signs, "Jigyaku no jutsu." (A/N: Time reversal technique). "Now breathe in deeply." He instructed. 

Itsu began to inhale deeply, and then exhale; relaxing her body. Soon enough she began to feel her eyes grow heavy with sleep, and her body go limp. There was a floating sensation that began to over take her, as she felt herself drift into a semi-conscious state. Her mind felt foggy; there was a faint ticking sound in the deep recesses of her psyche.

"You are now climbing backwards into your memories; to the earliest memory you can recall." The jackal ANBU began, "Go back, further and further into your history. You're moving quickly towards the past. And then you reach a day back when you were a young genin. Where are you?" he probed, taking her back to the last moment she had recalled on a previous hypnosis session.

"I'm in a field with my teammates. I remember…" Itsu replied

----------**Flashback**----------

The clear blue sky above them extended on for miles. It was a beautiful day in Konoha and all four members of team Ryoku had decided to take the day off to do some team bonding, which loosely translated to a picnic up on the grassy hill side near the Nara ranch. (A/N: in case anyone forgot, Ryoku is Gai, Genma, and Itsu's genin cell sensei).

"Why are we doing this again, sensei?" eleven year old Genma asked, as the four hiked up the hill, carrying the supplies.

"Because life isn't all about training and getting stronger; sometimes you have to stop and smell the roses." Ryoku explained.

"BUT RYOKU-SENSEI, I DON'T SEE ANY ROSES!" Gai exclaimed, as he visually scanned the hillside for a single rose bush.

"It means that you have to stop and enjoy the simple pleasures that life has got to offer." Nine year old Itsu explained, to her befuddled teammate.

"That's right." Ryoku patted Itsu's head in approval, "it means you have to enjoy your youth." He told Gai. (A/N: lol)

"YOSH!" Gai exclaimed, pumping his fist in the air, "THEN I SHALL ENJOY THE SPRINGTIME OF MY YOUTH!"

"'Springtime… of… youth'…?" Itsu quietly repeated the strange phrase.

"Don't ask, or he'll never stop." Genma whispered from behind her.

"Good point." She nodded, as the group starting putting everything down in the area their sensei had indicated as the spot for their picnic.

The four teammates proceed to set up the supplies. In the background, the birds, which had earlier been singing happily, quickly flew out of the trees located at the bottom of the hill side. Noticing the sudden stillness in the air, the ninja's turned to face in the direction were a powerful burst of chakra concentrated in a small spherical shape went flying through the trees.

"What was that?" Itsu asked, looking down at the pile of trees that had fallen due to the jutsu they have just witnessed.

"I believing there's a team training down there." Ryoku replied, as he set the picnic basket down on the blanket, and proceeded to pull out their lunches. "Now, let's eat!"

As the four quietly enjoyed their lunch, Gai kept turning his head down the slope of the hill wondering who the team, that seemed to be training so hard, was. After finishing their lunches and packing everything back up, Ryoku offered to take the three genin down to meet the team below, suspecting who the team was, and believing it would be a memorable experience to introduce the three genin to the strongest shinobi in the village.

As the four approached the small clearing in the forest at the foot of hill, Gai began to bounce around like a hyperactive chimpanzee. He rushed up to where a silver haired boy around his age who had walked over to a tree and picked up a bottle of water to drink from.

"I CHALLENGE YOU TO A BATTLE!" Gai proclaimed.

"Get out of my way, you idiot." the silver haired boy walked past Gai.

"Hey, what's the big idea?" Itsu demanded from the silver haired boy as she stomped over to where her teammate and the other boy were standing, "Don't call Gai an idiot, you jerk!"

Itsu walked up next to Gai and gave the other boy a shove, nearly pushing him to the ground. It was obvious though; that the only reason she'd even gotten close enough to push him was because he hadn't expected it from such a frail looking little girl.

Regaining his composure, Kakashi stared down the girl in front of him and said "Well look at him, what kind of freak wears bright green spandex?"

"What kind of freak wears a mask?" Itsu retorted.

"Tsk. Idiot." Kakashi scoffed.

"What did you say?!" Itsu began approaching him once more.

"Itsu-chan!" a voice from behind the trio stopped her.

"Obito?" Itsu turned to face the young boy wearing goggles on top of his head.

"What are you doing here cousin?" Obito asked as he walked towards the four; Genma having just moment's earlier stepped next to his female teammate, in case she were to be needing some assistance.

"WE WERE ENJOYING THE SPRING TIME OF OUR YOUTH!" Gai bounced up and down eagerly as he said this.

"Spring time…" Obito began.

"We were bonding." Itsu quickly explained.

"Yeah, well _we_ were training, now get lost, you're in the way." Kakashi demanded.

"Kakashi!" the blond man standing next to Ryoku scolded, "You shouldn't talk that way."

"WHO ARE YOU?" Gai enthusiastically asked the older man.

"This, my dear students, is none other than Konoha's Yellow Flash." Ryoku introduced the other sensei to his genin. "And his students Kakashi, Rin, and Obito." He then motioned towards his own team, "and these are my students: Genma, Gai, and Itsu." The young genin bowed to show their respect.

"We've met." He replied, nodding towards Itsu, "How is you father, Itsu-chan? I haven't seen him in a while."

"Neither have I." Itsu sadly sighed, "He's been out on a mission for a couple of months."

"Oh, I see, well, please let him know I said 'Hello' when he gets back." He requested, before ordering his students to return back to the forest so they could continue their training.

----------**End of Flashback**----------

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"So she remembers you now?" Genma asked, as a group of them sat at a table in Konoha's best Barbeque Restaurant.

"Yeah, she remembers me; unfortunately she only remembers up to the time when she hated me." Kakashi sighed heavily, as he slumped down in his seat.

"Oh, that's right; I forgot there was a time when you two didn't get along." Asuma chuckled, nearly causing his cigarette to fall out of his mouth.

"Served you right, Kakashi." Kurenai remarked, "You were always calling Gai an idiot, and refusing to battle him."

"Yeah, if it wasn't for her cousin Obito always sticking up for you and telling her you were a good guy; she never would have believed you were actually a decent person." Genma smirked. "Although back then, decent would be a stretch."

"Hey!" Kakashi replied offended, "I wasn't that bad."

"Yeah, you were." Asuma chuckled, "Face it, back then you were a real jerk."

"So when's her next session?" Kakashi turned to ask Shizune, who had been sitting in the corner listening to the others reminisce about a time when she no longer resided in Konoha.

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**A/N: **There appears to be a bit of a discrepancy between this and the last chapter. They key word here, is APPEARS. If anyone noticed, Tsunade mentioned in the previous chapter that ANBU was working forwards through Itsu's memories; Itsu mentioned that she HADN'T remembered Kakashi yet, and then there was the flashback where Gai and Genma were 13 and Itsu was 11… if you remember correctly, Gai was the one remembering, so we're not going backwards, because Itsu wouldn't have remembered that… oh and since Gai became a genin at age 7, they would have already been a team by the time he was age 11, at which age he became a chunin (lets assume he took the chunin exam _after_ he found out Kakashi was already a chunin)… just so you know...

Anyway… I hope you enjoyed the chapter. .. also... is it just me, or is acting up lately?...


	9. Uchiha

**Disclaimer**: I don't own Naruto

**Chapter summary**: It's about Itsu's relationship with the Uchiha clan.

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Naruto walked into the dango shop where he'd arranged to meet up with his friends. Behind him, standing as aloof and uncaring as ever, was Uchiha Sasuke.

"Hey Naruto." Kiba smiled, and motioned for the two to join the rest of the group.

Sitting besides Kiba, Shino gazed over at the two approaching figures. Across the table from the male members of team eight, Neji remained unmoved, not even so much as turning around to face the oncoming pair, while Lee enthusiastically jumped out of his seat to greet them.

"Naruto-san, Sasuke-san!" Lee ran over to the pair. "How are you feeling Sasuke-san?" he asked the Uchiha boy.

"Fine." Sasuke coldly replied, as the three made their way over to the table.

"Hey guy!" Naruto greeted the other three at the table, "Where are Shikamaru and Choji? I would have thought they'd be here by now." he searched to see if the boys of team ten might be sitting in another booth.

"They might be late; I think Ino had them lugging some crates in the flower shop or something." Kiba smirked.

"They're here." Shino said in his usual monotone voice, gesturing with his head towards the two guys walking in the door.

"Hey." Choji called out to the six guys already seated at their booth. Shikamaru merely nodded his head, not bothering to even speak.

The two of them chose their seats, with Shikamaru sitting down next to Neji, Lee, and Naruto, while Choji sat on the other side of the booth with Kiba, Shino, and Sasuke. After placing their orders the eight teens engaged in some superficial small talk, everyone seemingly sidestepping the subject of Sasuke's return and the consequences of his betrayal.

However, curiosity and distrust eventually had Shikamaru asking, "So, Sasuke." He paused as everyone turned to look at him, wondering what he might ask, "Neji told me that when his team brought you and that Itsu lady in, it seemed like she was carrying you here."

"What's you point?" Sasuke asked, irritated by what the lazy genius was implying.

"Just that it seems like you didn't come back to Konoha by choice; or am I wrong?" Shikamaru asked, knowing full well he was never wrong.

"…" Sasuke didn't answer the question.

He _**hadn't**_ come back to Konoha by choice, but admitting that might only worsen his punishment; besides, there was nowhere else for him to go. Until he found out where Itachi was, he would have to stay there. Now that Sasuke had improved his skills and gained the power he had longed for, all he needed was the opportunity, and next to Naruto was the best possible place to be; after all, it was only a matter of time before Itachi came back for the nine-tails.

"Hey." Kiba had never been one for awkward silences, so he decided to interrupt this one. "Speaking of Itsu, I hear she's a major babe. What can you tell us about her?" Kiba perversely smirked as he asked Sasuke. (A/N: I love Kiba's character… he's so fun).

"Why are you asking me?" Sasuke scoffed.

"Well, she _**is**_ your cousin." Choji pointed out.

"And we assume you know her, since she did help bring you here." Naruto added.

"She used her genjutsu on me, and then dragged me here." Sasuke replied, "That hardly makes for any real bonding, dobe."

"But she's still your cousin." Kiba replied. "You must have known her from before."

"We weren't exactly close." Sasuke informed them.

"Oh? Why not?" Naruto asked.

"She didn't live in the compound with the rest of the Uchiha's." He replied.

"What not?" Naruto repeated his question.

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"Fear." Tsunade turned towards Shizune, who was organizing some files on the Hokage's desk.

"Fear?" Shizune put the pile down and looked at the Hokage questioningly.

"That's right, fear." Tsunade replied, "There are always dangers that come with sealing a bijuu; it's often very difficult to control them, so naturally there's often a fear and hatred directed at the ones who possess demon spirits within them. To further complicate things, there was the problem that not even the third knew about the Uchiha's plan to seal the five tailed beast in the girl, so there was an additional fear that it could come back to hurt them. Then when they discovered that she was Jiraiya's daughter…" Tsunade trailed off.

"So she never really grew up with the rest of the Uchiha's then?" Shizune asked.

"No." Tsunade motioned for Shizune to continue working on the piles in front of them while they talked, "After Jiraiya returned from his extended mission, he stormed into the Uchiha complex and took her away from them."

"And they allowed it?" Shizune asked in her typical frantic tone.

"What choice did they have?" Tsunade chuckled at the thought, "He was one of the legendary sannin. Not even the mighty Uchiha clan would stand up against him." She arrogantly smirked. "Besides, I don't think they really wanted her there."

"Oh? Why's that?" Shizune asked, as she put away another file into an empty box.

"Like I said, fear." Tsunade passed her another file, "But also, I think they were ashamed. That's why no one ever knew, for many years, that Itsu carried the demon Houkou."

"But eventually others found out, right?" Shizune asked.

"Yes, but not very many." Tsunade explained, "For a long time, only the Uchiha's knew, and they made it a point not to interact with her what so over." She thought for a moment, "Actually, now that I think about it, with the exception of Uchiha Obito, I don't think she really had any contact with the Uchiha's at all."

"Obito…?" She repeated, "So is that how she and Kakashi met?" Shizune wondered.

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Kakashi began walking towards the Memorial Monument, where the names of those who died for the sake of the village were engraved on the surface of a carved stone. He had just returned from a short mission and as was his routine, he made his way towards the same name he carried within him for so many years. As he approached the oddly shaped stone, he noticed a figure looming over the monument. He was about to walk away and allow the person to be there privately, when he realized who it was that was standing before him.

"Itsu." He whispered softly.

Upon hearing her name, she turned to face the masked man standing a short distance behind her, then quickly turned back to face the stone. Believing this meant she had no objections to his presence, Kakashi walked up beside her and looked down on the name she had been tracing with her fingers.

"I remember this…" she whispered.

----------FLASHBACK----------

A thirteen year old Kakashi stood before the engraved monument of those ninja's who had lost their lives in service to the village. It was a dark and gloomy day, much the same as how Kakashi felt on the inside. He had been standing in front of the monument for hours; with one eye closed, the scar on it having had quickly healed, he looked down at the freshly carved name of his best friend: Uchiha Obito.

"He looked up to you." A voice from behind him startled Kakashi, though he didn't show it. He had been so wrapped up in his own thoughts, that he hadn't noticed anyone coming up behind him. "I know you had your differences, but my cousin really admired you. That's why he tired so hard."

He didn't need to turn to know who it was. He and Itsu were not on the friendliest of terms, due largely to the fact that Kakashi couldn't stand her goofy teammate, and she often yelled at him for insulting Gai. But over the two years they had known each other, he had seen more and more of her, often in the company of either Gai or Obito, with whom she shared close friendships.

"You've been here for a while, haven't you?" Itsu quietly asked.

"Hai." Kakashi mechanically responded.

"You were here when I came this morning." She stated, "Have you been here this whole time?"

"Hai." Kakashi softly replied.

"Have you eaten at all today?" She asked.

As if in respond to her question, Kakashi's stomach suddenly growled, but he paid no attention to it.

"Come on." She grabbed hold of his hand. The sudden motion shook Kakashi out of his trance, and he turned to face her.

Itsu looked at the masked shinobi. There were traces of dry tears trailing down his face, reaching the edge of the mask that covered most of his face. The sorrow and pain in his single open eye sent a pang of sadness through Itsu's heart. She looked upon him in a new light. No longer was he the jerk who insulted her teammate and cousin, but a young man with a deep soul and a caring heart.

She leaned in to trace her finger over the scar covering his left eye. Kakashi slightly cringed at the sudden closeness, but made no move to stop her. She didn't ask why he kept that eye closed; she had already been told by Rin, during their medic training, what had happened.

"It must be hard to remember to keep that eye closed." She observed.

"Sometimes." He replied.

"Here." She took the left side of his forehead protector and slanted it to cover his sharingan eye. "That should help."

"Thanks." Kakashi replied, realizing that it did in fact help him forget about trying to close it. With the forehead protector serving as a sort of eye patch, it made it easier for him to keep his eye closed without having to think too much about it.

"Come on." She tugged on his hand and began pulling him back towards the village.

"Where are you taking me?" he asked.

"We're going to get something to eat." She sweetly smiled up at him.

----------FLASHBACK----------

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**A/N**: awww… that just played out so cute in my mind…lol… in my head, the conversation between the guy's in the first "scene" carried over to the conversation between Tsunade and Shizune… just in case you missed that… anyway… yeah… my attempt at segues… hope it made sense…


	10. Ramen

**Disclaimer**: I don't own Naruto

**Chapter summary**: Ramen (lol… not really, but that's what connects these two scenes).

**Thanks for the reviews: **babygurl1012, PhantomGirl94, and Princesa de la Luna

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After returning from another mission to track the Akatsuki, Jiraiya made his way out of the Hokage's office, over to the jonin dorms, where Tsunade had given Itsu a place to stay until she recovered her memories. The legendary toad sage approached the room that had been assigned to his daughter, hoping that it was not too late in the evening for her to accompany him for dinner.

Jiraiya lightly knocked on the door, trying not to disturb the other jonin in the apartment's next door. There was a gentle rumbling behind the door, then the sound of the lock turning, before the silver haired kunoichi answered the door.

"Hello." Jiraiya cheerfully greeted her.

"Hi." Itsu stared up at the sannin, who stood almost a foot taller than her.

"Would you care to join me for a late night snack?" he asked, motioning for her to come out.

"Okay." She followed after him.

The two walked silently through the dark streets of Konoha, until they made it to a brightly lit ramen stand. Though it was not considerably late, the streets had nonetheless seemed strangely deserted, further emphasizing the silence as the pair walked to the Ichiraku ramen stand.

"ERO-SENNIN!" a blond boy sitting on a red stool, in the ramen stand, shouted in their direction.

"Ero-sennin?" Itsu turned to face Jiraiya, whose left eye nervously twitched.

"HOW MANY TIMES HAVE I TOLD YOU TO STOP CALLING ME THAT?!?!" Jiraiya shouted at the young boy. His loud shouts vibrated through the empty streets.

"Sorry, I forgot." Naruto sheepishly replied, while scratching his head.

"Itsu, I want to introduce you to my new apprentice." Jiraiya motioned towards the boy, "this is Naruto." He placed his big hand over the boy's head, and ruffled his hair. "And you remember Itsu, from that day at the hospital, right Naruto?" he asked the blond shinobi.

"You're the lady who brought Sasuke back." Naruto broadly smiled at the kunoichi as she sat down on the stool next to him.

"Yes." She eyed the young boy carefully, "you know… you look an awful lot like –"

"Yeah." Jiraiya cut in.

"So…" Naruto continued without noticing the knowing look that passed between the two jonin sitting next to him. "Have you remembered everything yet?" Naruto asked Itsu, while Jiraiya turned to Ayame to place their orders.

"Not everything." She replied.

"But you remembered Kaka-sensei right?" Naruto asked, as Ichiraku handed him a new bowl.

"Why does everyone keep asking me that?" Itsu turned to asked Jiraiya, who merely shrugged.

The reason, though, was known to everyone within Konoha. There were three pools running between some of the villagers, concerning the relationship between Kakashi and Itsu. One was to see when Itsu would remember Kakashi, another to see when she would remember how she really felt about him, and finally, the third pool was regarding how she would react when she eventually put all the pieces together. At first it had been a small group of their friends, but eventually the majority of the village became increasingly interested to see how it would all play out.

"Because –" Naruto began.

"We just want to know what you've remembered so far." Jiraiya cut in, before Naruto could ruin the game.

"Ok." She replied, though she wasn't entirely convinced. "But I get the impression that there's something specific about Kakashi I'm supposed to remember."

"I'm sure you're just imagining things." Jiraiya replied as he took the chopsticks in the cylinder to his right; Ayame having placed their bowls in front of them.

"Maybe..." Itsu said thoughtfully, as she too took her chopsticks and began eating.

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The next morning, Itsu woke up early and decided to take a jog around the village. Since she had begun to train with Gai and his team, she had realized that the secret to his success in taijutsu was that he constantly challenged himself and trained his body to endure the craziest of physical exertion. While she admired this about him, she wasn't about to perform any of the insane tasks he set up for himself, but following his advice to better her taijutsu skills, she decided she _**would**_ start doing laps around the village, though not nearly as many as him.

The morning was looking like it would be a very beautiful day. The sun was shining brightly in the clear blue sky. There was a crisp spring smell blowing in the breeze. Though it was still early out, the villagers were already running around, beginning their daily chores. Itsu had been running for the past three hours and had decided it was time for a break. Her stamina was rather good, but she still had plans to train later on in the day, and didn't want to tire herself out too soon.

She began walking through the streets to get to her apartment, when, out of the corner of her eye, she spotted an orange blur rush past her.

"Naruto?" she called out.

The boy in question abruptly stopped, no more than five yards in front of her.

"Huh?" he turned around, scanning the area to see who had called out his name. "Oh, hey Itsu-chan." He walked over to her.

"Chan?" she arched her right eyebrow.

"I call everyone 'chan'" Naruto impishly grinned. "I hope you don't mind."

"No, not at all." Itsu smiled reassuringly. "So where were you off to in such a hurry?" she asked.

"Oh, Kaki-sensei has us meeting early to train today." He explained, "I woke up a bit late, and I wanted to go eat breakfast before I had to meet my team at the training grounds." He quickly replied; obviously in a rush.

"Oh." Itsu said, after she caught up with what he had said, "Well I was on my way to eat something too, mind if I join you?" she asked.

"Sure." Naruto smiled widely as the two made their way over to the Ichiraku Ramen stand.

"You really like your ramen don't you?" Itsu smirked, as she saw how eagerly the boy rushed to the red stools.

"Yup! It's my favorite thing in the world to eat." He said, before ordering his bowl.

After Ayame brought the two of them their meals, Naruto began to eat as quickly as possible, making small talk about the different types of ramen as he ate, while Itsu played around with her chopsticks and twirled the noodles in her bowl. Finally, after numbering the many types of ramen he loved, Naruto became completely silent; a serious look spread across his face.

"Itsu-chan?" Naruto turned to face the silver haired kunoichi.

"Yes?" she arched her eyebrow, seeing in his face that he had something to ask her.

"What was it like…" he began, unable to bring himself to really ask what he had wanted to ask since that day in the hospital when he had discovered that she, like him, was a Jinchūriki.

"What was what like?" she searched his face for a clue of what he might be thinking.

"What was it like, for you…" he gathered all his courage to ask, "growing up… being a Jinchūriki?" he finally asked.

"Oh." Itsu's face dropped, as she stared into her now, half empty bowl of ramen. At first she was reluctant to relive those memories, but she saw the curiosity, and something else, hidden behind Naruto's eyes, "Quiet." She replied solemnly. "It felt… isolating."

"Quiet. Isolating." Naruto repeated the words, knowing the depth of their meaning, through his own personal experience.

"I felt… alone." She continued.

"Alone." Naruto thought for a second. "But, how's that possible? You were part of one of the biggest clans in the village." He wondered, having always believed that if he had at least one family member when he was growing up, hated by the entire village, then perhaps he would not have felt so alone all those years ago.

"Well, I didn't really grow up with the Uchiha clan." Itsu explained.

"Yeah, Sasuke told us." Naruto replied. "But he didn't say why."

"He probably didn't know." Itsu guessed, "In fact, I didn't know until I was about eight or nine years old. I could always sense the hatred and anger my clan felt for me, but I never understood why; until one day, my cousin Obito invited me over to the complex, and one of the elders called me a name." she explained, in a sad, somber tone.

"What kind of name?" Naruto asked, accepting the bowl of ramen that Itsu pushed over to his side.

"She called me… 'Houkou'" she sighed, "And said I was a demon spawn." She fought back to urge to smash something, at the memory of how hurt she had felt when the old woman called her that, though at the time she had no idea what it meant. "I asked my father what she meant by that, and he explained how the five-tailed demon, Houkou, had been sealed within me, before I was even born, and how my mother had been sacrificed in order for the seal to work."

"…" for once in his life, Naruto couldn't think of a thing to say.

"After that, I did everything possible, to not stand out." She gravely remembered.

"That's funny." Naruto seriously replied, "_**I**_ did everything I could to be _**noticed**_."

Looking down at his brightly colored clothes, Itsu smiled, seeing the truth in his words, "I think the difference is that, with you, everyone knew." She reasoned, "Whereas with me, it was just my clan who knew." She said thoughtfully, "I saw the hatred in their eyes, and that's why I tried to go unnoticed; I didn't want the rest of the village to see me with those eyes. So I did everything I could to not stand out. I did what was expected of me; played the role of the noble daughter. I went to the academy, worked very hard, behaved myself, took medic courses, as was expected of a good kunoichi at the time; I did everything I could to be like any other girl. Anything… to blend in."

"Blend in?" Naruto cocked his head, and then pointed at her hair.

Itsu chuckled slightly at the amused look on the young boy's face, "Yeah." She smiled, "my hair didn't really make it easy, I even tried to color my hair once, but my father stopped me." She smiled at the memory.

Naruto broke into a fit of laughter, "I never would have imaged ero-sennin as the fatherly type." He explained, after Itsu gave him a confused look.

"No?" she wondered, "I thought he took you under his wing." She pointed out.

"That's different." Naruto replied, "He's training me. Plus, it's not like he's all that nice about it." He slouched on his stool remembering the countless times he had tired to get Jiraiya to play with him, or do something other than training.

Itsu smiled, amused at Naruto's frustration. "I image if he'd had a son, he'd probably have treated him much the same way." She said, thoughtfully, "Besides, you should consider yourself lucky. He is, after all, one of the legendary sannin. Not to mention, the last person he trained was the Yondaime."

"Didn't he train you?" Naruto asked, curiously.

"Well yeah, but… I'm his daughter." She stated, "Plus, I had my own sensei."

"I bet that's why he was so good at helping me tap into the nine-tails' chakra." Naruto said, thoughtfully.

"What do you mean?" Itsu asked.

"Well, he already had practice." Naruto smiled triumphantly at his self perceived genius.

"You know kid," Itsu suppressed a laugh, "You're not as dumb as you look." She paid for their breakfast and stood to leave.

"Thanks." Naruto exclaimed, both from what she's said, but also for her paying for his meal, "… hey!" he yelled, as he followed behind Itsu, who had already begun making her way towards the training grounds.

"Come on now. I'll walk with you. Hurry up though, you're going to be late." She called back.

"Why do you want to walk me there?" Naruto asked, once he caught up with her.

"Because I just remembered something." She stated without further explanation.

"Remembered what?" he asked.

"I'll tell you when we get there." She replied.

They quickly walked toward team seven's training grounds, arriving 15 minutes late. Sakura and Sasuke were already present, still waiting for their sensei to show up. Moment's after Naruto and Itsu arrived, Kakashi finally poofed in.

"You're late!" Naruto and Sakura yelled in unison.

Without even looking up from his green book, the gray haired shinobi began his latest excuse, "Sorry, Sorry… You see the universe is expanding, so it took me a little longer to get here." He explained.

At that, Sakura and Naruto merely stared in disbelief, while Sasuke impassively looked out into the horizon, not caring for any sort of excuse; beside them, Itsu giggled at Kakashi's reason, causing Kakashi to drop his book when he realized who the giggling was coming from.

"That was it." Itsu looked over at Naruto.

"What was?" the blond boy asked, confused as to what she was referring to.

"I remembered how much I enjoyed hearing Kakashi's excuses." She replied, before waving good-bye and walking back towards the village.

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**A/N:** I really love this chapter… lol… I, like most Kakashi fans, LOVE his excuses… my favorite, of course, being "I got lost on the road of life." And the new one, from Shippuuden 21, "I was thinking about the true meaning of life…" but he didn't get to finish, I image he would have said he lost track of time or something… anywho… I love his "deep" and "philosophical" reasons for being late, so I thought I'd add one into this story… worked out perfectly with the shippuuden episode… I'm going to go watch that piece again… lol…


	11. By The River

**Disclaimer**: I don't own Naruto

**Chapter summary**: a break in, a date, a flashback, some secrets, and a lost bet… lol… I'm not much for summaries.

**Thanks for the reviews**

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It was around midday, and Itsu had just finished her last class at the academy. Tsunade had requested that she teach a few medic courses in place of taking missions. Itsu had wanted to be of some use to the village, but because her memory had not yet fully returned, the hokage couldn't risk her going out on missions and possibly recalling some traumatic event during the course; she had reasoned that if that were to happen, Itsu could be a danger to herself and her comrades, not to mentioned jeopardizing the mission. So instead, she had been assigned to teach different level medic course's, from basic to intermediate and advanced. Haruno Sakura, the Hokage's apprentice, had been assigned as her assistant. Though the girl was much younger than Itsu, and far less experienced, she had proven to be an invaluable asset to the classes, having mastered most of the medic techniques in a short span of time. Together, the two kunoichi taught academy students, genin, chunin, and new jonin, alike.

As Itsu approached the Godaime's office, she heard a loud commotion, and decided to walk in through the open doors instead of waiting to be called in. Inside, she saw Tsunade throwing stacks of files and papers all over the room, as Shizune followed behind, trying her best to keep things organized. To the right of the two women, Kakashi and Genma stood stiffly, as if wondering whether to leave before they too joined the stacks of papers and the hokage decided to toss them around.

"Excuse me?" Itsu called out from the door way. Everyone immediate turned to face her.

"Itsu?" Tsunade looked at her questioningly, "what are you doing here?" she asked.

"I came to turn in some reports on the progress of the class." Itsu explained, scanning the room for some sort of explanation as to why the hokage had gone on a rampage. "But I can come back, if you're busy." She offered.

"No, it's fine." Tsunade sighed, as she moved over to her chair and sat down. "We're just having some problems."

"What kind of problems?" Genma asked, having been wondering what the whole scene had been about since he and Kakashi had entered the office five minutes earlier.

"Someone broke into the Hokage's office." Shizune explained.

"And they did all this?" Kakashi asked, arching his one visible eyebrow questioningly.

"Well… no." Shizune began, "not exactly."

"Everything was spotless." Tsunade finally said. "Exactly the same as I left it last night."

"Then what makes you think someone broke in?" Itsu asked, wondering what could have tipped her off.

"My chair." Tsunade replied.

"You're chair?" Genma, Kakashi, and Itsu asked in unison.

"Yes." Tsunade explained, "It was half an inch higher then I left it."

"Half an inch?" Genma and Kakashi repeated, their eyes having grown to twice their size because of the shock. Itsu merely stood silently, amazed that the Godaime could have noticed such a slight discrepancy.

"And so how did everything…" Genma began, before he realized that the mess in the office was probably made by the hokage herself. "Never mind." He mumbled.

"So Itsu, how are the medic courses going?" Genma turned to face his former teammate.

"They're going well, thanks for asking." She replied. Remembering why she had come to the office in the first place, she walked over to Tsunade's desk and handed her the reports she's come in with.

"How is Sakura doing?" Kakashi asked from behind her.

"She's doing well." Itsu turned to face the masked shinobi. "She's very skilled; you both must be very proud of her." She addressed Kakashi and Tsunade.

"She is very talented." Tsunade agreed.

"And she's always been very bright." Kakashi added.

"Well, I should be going now." Itsu said, "Kurenai and Anko are probably waiting." She began walking out before turning back, "Shizune weren't you going to come too?"

"Ummm…" Shizune looked around the room dreadfully.

"Go!" Tsunade ordered, "Take your lunch, I have to get Kakashi and Genma's mission report anyway. I'll send for Kotetsu and Izumo to come in here and clear things up."

"Ok." Shizune said, relieved she wouldn't have to clean up the mess. She began walking towards the door with Itsu.

Just as they were about to leave again, Itsu turned, "By the way," she asked, "Did you discover what they were looking for?"

"Who?" Tsunade asked.

"Whoever broke in." Itsu replied.

"No." Tsunade shook her head. "The place was spotless. We even checked the surveillance tapes, and nothing. Whoever it was… did a good job of hiding their tracks. I don't think there are more than a handful of shinobi in the village who could be that thorough."

"Oh." She replied, before making her way back towards the exit.

"Itsu!" a voice called out, causing her to turn back around.

"Yes, Kakashi?" she asked.

"um…" he nervously stroked the side of his face with one finger, "Would you like to go out to dinner tonight?" he finally asked, much to the surprise of the silver haired kunoichi and the three other ninja present in the room with them.

"Sure." She smiled reassuringly, "pick me up at 7." At that, the two women finally walked out.

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6:57. Itsu finished brushing her hair as she looked over at the clock on the nightstand next to her bed. Even though he only lived a few doors down in the jonin dorms, Itsu was sure she still had plenty of time before Kakashi came to pick her up. With three minutes before seven, Itsu's nerves began acting up. She wasn't sure why, but ever since she'd agreed to dinner, she had been unable to think of anything else; and she was getting quite nervous.

A sudden knock at the door jarred Itsu out of her thoughts. She walked over to the door, before quickly glancing back at the clock; 6:59.

"You're early." She said as she opened to door to find Kakashi on the other side.

"Am I?" he asked, causally scratching his head with his left hand, while his right hand was held behind his back.

"Well, no, but…" she noticed he was hiding something behind his back, "I expected you to be late." She finished mechanically, eyeing his right arm curiously, wondering what he might be hiding.

"I could leave and come back later if you want." He offered jokingly.

"No." she smiled, "No, it's okay. I'm ready." She turned around and grabbed a thin sweater to take with her. It had been a bit chilly with the scattered spring showers coming and going every so often. "So…" she asked as she turned back around after locking her door, "what's that behind your back?" she finally asked.

He sheepishly pulled forward his right arm and handed her the flowers he'd been hiding behind his back. It was a lovely arrangement of a dozen small five-petal blue flowers, with yellow centers. A flower that represented true love, but the name itself was what caught Itsu's attention… forget-me-not.

"Thank you." She smiled as she took the beautiful bouquet.

"Shall we go?" Kakashi offered his right arm, and she accepted, latching her left arm under his.

They walked through the streets until they arrived at the restaurant. Itsu hadn't been there yet, but she had heard from the other girls that Amatsuteien was the most romantic restaurant in the village. She didn't have time to think about the implications of what this might mean though, because as soon as she walked through the doors, she was violently engulfed by a feeling of nostalgia. (A/N: Amatsuteien is a word I made up, it's composed of two words: Amatsu, which means heavenly; and Teien, which means garden … so basically Amatsuteien means heavenly garden).

"I've been here before…" Itsu asked, somewhat in a daze.

"Yeah." Kakashi replied.

They were seated in a corner booth and told their meal would arrive soon. Itsu looked over at Kakashi, wondering what the waiter meant since they hadn't yet ordered.

"Don't worry." He replied, "I ordered ahead. I got your favorite." He smiled under his mask.

"Favorite?" she wondered, but shook her head for him to forget it. It had been happening often enough, especially with Kakashi, people would guess at her likes and dislikes; she concluded that it was probably due to the fact that they knew her already, even if she didn't remember it yet.

As they waited for their meal to arrive, Kakashi told Itsu about everything that had happened during the five and a half years that she'd been missing. She had heard from other people about the death of the third, as well as the attack of the village by Orochimaru, and the new alliance with the Sand, but hearing the stories from Kakashi added a new level to them; she almost felt like she had lived through those years in the village herself.

"So tell me." Kakashi began, "What did you do all those years?" there was a cautious tone to his voice, as if he feared the memories of what that question would bring up might break her.

"It was…" she paused to think for a moment, "cold." She finished.

"Cold?" he furrowed his brow, puzzled.

**----------****FLASHBACK****----------**

Nearly six years in the past, Itsu had awoken in the middle of a clearing, half her body still caught in the rushing river, while her upper half had landed on the wet river bank, next to a large boulder. It was the only thing that kept her from being pulled away by the river. As she stood up to exam her surroundings, she looked upon the river with terror. It was dyed in red, the color of blood. As she looked down upon herself and saw the tattered remains of what appeared to be her clothes, she noticed the cuts and bruises that covered her small frame. Her hair was matted against her scalp, both from the wetness of the river water, and the blood that had caked it to her skull.

As she continued to look around and wonder how she had ended up there, and in the condition that she found herself, it dawned on her; not only did she not know how or why she was where she was, she couldn't remember WHO she was. Her initial reaction was the panic. An urge to run or scream ran through her, but she resisted it. Instead she began picking up the scattered weapons she found laying on the forest floor, figuring that whatever reason she found herself in her current state might require her to defend herself.

As she began wandering the forest in her state of near undress, she wondered again what had happened. What could have possibly have caused her to end up out there in the middle of nowhere, covered in blood, and half dead. She tried to remember who she was and what had happened, but only succeeded in giving her self a migraine. As she walked further down the river, figuring that down would be safer, though upstream might provide her with answers, she saw a village in the distance. She decided to seek help in the village, telling herself that she could always go back upstream at a later time to find the answers she sought; but that never happened. By the time she returned to the river, the stream had been cleared away all her blood, and the river flowed from many directions; too many to follow, and considering the cuts had already begun to heal, she was uncertain how far she had actually drifted down; perhaps for hours, maybe even days.

Entering the remote village, she was greeted with terrified, concerned, and bewildered expressions. An older woman eventually came up to her and offered her something to cover herself with. She took Itsu back to her home and offered the lost girl a shower, fresh clothes and a warm meal, which Itsu all too happily accepted. Itsu remained in the village for many weeks, helping the old woman around the house and taking odd jobs in the village, as she attempted to piece together what little evidence there was of that day she walked out of the river. For many weeks all her attempts at discovering who she was and where she'd come from had led her to dead ends. Eventually she gave up and decided to take a different approach. She discovered she was considerably faster, stronger, and more strategic in her thinking then the rest of the villagers. Someone suggested that perhaps she came from a shinobi village. Since she had taken quickly to and become adept at using the weapons she had picked up that day by the river, she concluded that perhaps that was a fair assessment, and decided she would go to one of those villages and see if she found more clues to her past.

She had gone in search of herself, but had ended up finding someone entirely frightening. She had done things to survive that no one should ever have to do; seen things no one should ever have to see; felt things no one should ever have to feel. She became the demon she had not known she carried; gave into it's instincts to survive. She had become a ghost in the world; selling her talents and skills to earn a living. She became a mercenary, a spy, a murderer, and it had all been for not; she was no closer to discovering her truth than she had been that day by the river.

But all that changed one day, when she spotted an eerily familiar face. He had been walking through the village she was currently residing in. The instant that she saw him, a chill ran down her spin. She felt a terror she had not felt since the day by the river, many years before. But combine with that chill, there was a fire burning in her; a rage swept through her and without even thinking, she attacked. They had been close to the village's edge, very near the forest, which provided cover and a place to hide, but the boy she met there didn't run or hide, he fought back. For what reason, Itsu had been unsure, but didn't care, she continued to fight, and she dominated him with her genjutsu and elemental ninjutsu. She had been close to throwing the final blow, when she realized… this wasn't who she thought it was; it couldn't be. Whoever she had confused the boy with, would have had to age during the time that she had been lost to herself, and to the world she had come from; but this boy looked far too young to be anyone who she could have known before. As the boy lay unconscious before her; hanging on to his life by sheer will, she took a glimpse into his mind. In it, she found a name, a village. She decided she owed him enough to take him home, and what's more, she saw something in his mind, a place she knew; perhaps a light onto that which she had long since begun doubting she would ever discover… truth.

**----------****END OF FLASHBACK****----------**

"So you essentially relearned everything?" Kakashi asked, rather impressed with this information.

"Basically." Itsu replied, "But..." she paused thoughtfully, "it was more then that… it was… primitive… instinctive… like the demon inside me was guiding me through it; helping me remember what I already knew." A look of sorrow swept across Itsu's face at the memories of all she had seen and done during her absence from the village hidden in the leaves came back to her, but she quickly shook it off, not wanting to ruin the mood.

"So…" Kakashi stalled, "during all those years, you didn't…"

"Didn't what?" Itsu eyed him curiously.

"Did you meet anyone?" he nervously asked.

"I met lots of people." She answered, watching him squirm slightly, "but if you mean, romantically" she smirked, "no." at that, he seemed to relax.

"Why not?" he wondered.

"I don't know…" she replied in a drab tone, "I guess, I was too busy searching for me, to find anyone else." She concluded.

"Makes sense." He shook his head lightly in understanding.

"Besides," she beguiled his interest once more, "I never met anyone who really caught my eye." She calmly said, looking deeply into his one visible eye.

"Oh?..." the masked shinobi leaned in, across the table.

"Yeah…" she replied, leaning in on her side as well.

Slowly, the two leaned in closer and closer to one another, closing the distance between them, as they stared into each other's gazes. And just as it appear liked their lips would connect, the waiter arrived with their dinner, causing Itsu to jump back, barely missing the tray next to her head.

"Shoot! So close" a disappointed voice said on the other side of the room.

"Pay up." Jiraiya extended his hand to the woman hiding in the shadows with him, watching the couple's date from across the room.

"Fine!" Tsunade paid the man what little she still had left, as she took another sip of the sake sitting in front of her. "but you know it was close."

"Nah." Jiraiya said, "she's not going to kiss him until she knows for sure what's going on."

"You so sure about that?" Tsunade asked skeptically.

Jiraiya merely nodded his head, as he took a bite of the food he's ordered earlier.

"I'm not so sure." Tsunade stated, "after all, she's on a date with the man. I think her attraction for him is undeniable. Even if she doesn't remember everything yet, she still feels what she's always felt for him."

"Maybe so, but I still don't think she'd do anything. She's always been a very cautious girl." Jiraiya continued to eat his meal.

"Love can make even the most cautious person, do the most reckless things." Tsunade mused.

"So double or nothing?" Jiraiya smirked.

"You're on!" The two shook on it.

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**A/n:** this chapter's good too… lol… I love it. I seem to get all my best ideas in the shower or right when I'm about to fall asleep… I should shower and nap more often… lol…

This is my longest chapter so far… for any of my stories. It's hard to get a chapter this long out in one day, but when the idea's flow, it's nice.

Anyway, I hope you all enjoyed this chapter as much as I did. There's a lot of explanation, and some foreshadowing of sorts (especially in the first scene, though I'm not sure if it's all that obvious, still I kind of like it that way).

Please review and tell me what you think… but be kind, because I worked really hard on this chapter and I really like it. Thanks. Also… I've noticed there are a lot more hits on this story then I would have expected considering I took off all the tags to it (essentially making it a sort of hidden story). I'm curious; for those that haven't been reading it since I started, how exactly are you finding this story?

One more thing… lol… I have no idea how Kakashi would kiss with his mask on, but I don't really want him walking around the village without it… I'll remove the mask only in private, but that'll be in a chapter later on in the story…

Oh and babygurl1012, that scene with Jiraya/Kakashi or Jiraiya/Itsu (haven't decided) I promised you is coming up soon enough, I just haven't worked out exactly how I'm going to do it yet, but I definitely plan on including it**. :D**


	12. Genjutsu

**Disclaimer**: I don't own Naruto

**Chapter summary**: "Sorry I tired to kill you."… lol… great summary huh:P

**Thanks for the reviews: **babygurl1012, always great to hear from you :D; Kiri Yumiko, thanks for the review, I'm glad to hear someone actually likes how I wove this character into the story and into the other character's lives. Thanks for the reviews.

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"You've been back for a while now." Naruto said to the young Uchiha.

"What's your point?" Sasuke muttered.

"Maybe it's time you did more than just train." Naruto exclaimed. Mostly because it was true, but also because he was getting hungry and didn't want to be out training for very much longer.

The two teammates were out in the forest sparing together, a routine they'd recently started every day after practice with their team.

"Why?" he asked, as he threw another punch at the blond, who quickly dodged it.

"Because that's what people do." He replied, jumping up into the tree and preparing himself to throw barrage of kunai at his friend.

"I'm not done with my mission, and you know that." Sasuke retreated up to a tree opposite from Naruto.

"Ero-sennin is doing his best to track the Akatsuki. We'll find him." He said, before sending a wave of kunai and shuriken towards his sparing partner, who quickly evaded them.

"Stay out of it Naruto." Sasuke yelled, before jumping over to the same limb the blond shinobi was standing on.

"Come on, let's go." Naruto climbed down from the tree and started picking up his scattered weapons.

"We're not done yet." Sasuke protested.

"Yes we are." Naruto exclaimed, "Besides, I'm starving."

"Fine." Sasuke reluctantly gave in.

The two began walking towards the village. The villagers watch as the pair made their way towards Naruto's favorite ramen stand, whispering as they went by. When they finally arrived, there was someone already seated at the Ichiraku ramen stand.

"Hey Naruto." The silver haired kunoichi called out as the two younger boys approached her.

"Hi Itsu-chan." Naruto broadly smiled.

"Hello Sasuke." Itsu greeted the other boy. Sasuke merely nodded his head in acknowledgement. "Naruto, I've been looking for you." She told the blond.

"For me? What for?" he asked.

"Tsunade-sama asked me to find you and tell you to go to her office." She explained.

"Really? Is it a new mission?" he asked excitedly.

"I don't know, she just told me to find you." Itsu replied.

"Oh. Okay." He jumped out of the stool he'd climbed onto, forgetting for a moment that he was hungry. "Hey, could you keep Sasuke-teme company while I go talk to the old lady?" he asked Itsu.

"Sure." Itsu replied, looking over at the brooding Uchiha.

With that, Naruto dashed off towards the hokage tower; leaving the two Uchiha's sitting alone at the ramen stand.

"So…" Itsu tried to break the awkward silence. "Sorry about… you know… almost killing you." She awkwardly smiled and the younger boy.

"Hn." Sasuke replied, not really sure what to say to that.

"It's just…" Itsu began, "I thought you were… never mind." She stopped herself.

"You fought him?" Sasuke asked, not really needing to specify who they were both referring to.

"It seems that way." Itsu replied, "But I can't really remember."

"But you beat him?" Sasuke turned his head slightly to look at her out of the corner of his eye.

"What makes you say that?" she wondered.

"You survived the clan's slaughter." He stated.

"So did you." She replied.

"Only because he allowed it…" he paused, "but I never fought him."

"I see." Itsu replied.

"But you did." He continued.

"I guess so." She submitted.

"So you did defeat him." He insisted.

"I don't think so." She paused, "I certainly didn't feel like I had won that day when I woke up in a river of my own blood." She shuttered at the memory, though not nearly enough to be noticeable.

"Could you have beaten him?" he asked, turning fully to face her.

"I never fought him before." She stated, "So I can't be certain."

"…" Sasuke remained quiet, waiting for her to continue.

"I have never seen him fight before." She explained, "So I don't know what the extent of his ability is. It's possibly, that like most Sharingan users, his taijutsu isn't his strongest ability. Mind you, that doesn't mean Uchiha's are bad at taijutsu, but we tend to rely more heavily on genjutsu because of the sharingan, and focus less on taijutsu, but we're still stronger and faster then your average shinobi."

"…" this was nothing that Sasuke didn't already know. He, however, had dedicated himself to honing his taijutsu and ninjutsu skills, preferring them to the genjutsu his brother used.

"Of course, he is a prodigy." Itsu continued, "So he'd be smart enough to know that taijutsu could be his weakness if he didn't train hard enough. Chances are he has worked on in considerably. Unless of course he's arrogant enough to believe no one could get past his genjutsu, which would be rather reckless. I don't know how his genjutsu has progressed over the years, but back then, I'm certain he couldn't have defeated me with genjutsu alone."

"Is that so?" Sasuke questioned.

"My demon is the god of illusions; you should know how that would give me an edge over the average genjutsu user. And though an Uchiha, especially Itachi, is anything but average, my Uchiha blood still counts for something." She stated.

"So you believe the fight was mostly genjutsu?" he questioned.

"I don't know for sure, but I can't imagine it having been much of a physical fight when both Itachi and my skills are primarily genjutsu." She reasoned.

"I heard you were stronger." He stated, "Stronger than him."

"There are different kinds of strength." She explained, "My genjutsu at the time would most probably have been stronger than his, because, as I said, I had an advantage that he didn't. However, as shinobi, we know there are ways to overcome differences in yours' and your enemy's abilities, strategies you can use to your advantage; Itachi was no fool, he would have used everything he possibly could to give himself an edge."

"…" Sasuke digested what the kunoichi had told him. "Do you still believe your genjutsu is better then his?" he asked.

Itsu stared at the boy for a while, wondering what he could possibly be getting at. "I couldn't say." She truthfully replied. "I haven't made as much progress on my skills as I would have been able to had I not lost my memory." She explained, "Before, I had six years of experience on him, but now, while I was trying to relearn everything I'd lost, he was most likely growing in his skills uninterruptedly."

"So at most, you might be evenly matched?" he asked.

"It's not that simple." She replied, "Everyone grows at different paces, and he is a prodigy. I may have a god of illusion sealed within me, whose chakra and power's I can tap into, but Itachi has his genius and ability to learn at an accelerated rate. I can tell you, though, my abilities in genjutsu aren't by any means mediocre." She plainly stated, without a hint of vanity in her words. "Is that what you wanted to know?" she asked.

"That." He replied, "and I want you to train me." He stated, "In genjutsu." He clarified.

"To defeat him?" she asked, already knowing the answer to her question.

"Hai." He replied honestly.

"Fine." She replied, "But before we begin, let me remind you of a saying." She looked in straight in the eye, "Any man who embarks on a journey of revenge should always remember to dig two graves before he begins."**(1) **With that, she stood up and started walking towards the hokage tower.

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**A/N: **I know, it's considerably shorter than the last few chapters (still over a 1000 words long, so it's not _**that**_ short), but I wrote this down earlier today and I've been stuck as to what to write next, and since I didn't want this just sitting here in front of me for me to mess with, I decided to just post it and maybe it'll clear things up so I can come up with the next chapter.

**(1)** "Before you embark on a journey of revenge, dig two graves." Is a Confucius quote… I changed it (just a little) to make it fit better…

**one last thing, in the story of the 5 tailed dog demon, while the kyuubi is a fire element (being the god of fire), Houkou attacks using a mixture of elements (Wind, Water, Earth, Lightning and Fire... one for each tail); Houkou is skilled in each kind of element ability, and can also create instantaneously each kind of natural disaster. It's symbolic element, though, is illusion, because Houkou is the god of illusions, which I found really interesting, which is why i chose it. Houkou is also the third strongest of the bijuu, (the second one being the 8 tails and the 9 tails, of course, being the strongest of them all; although technically, Houkou only ever lost one battle, to Kyuubi). I don't know how, yet, but I want to use all of this background into the story... but later.**


	13. Cheater

**Disclaimer**: I don't own Naruto

**Chapter summary**: There's a festival soon. ALSO PLEASE READ THE AUTHOR'S NOT AT THE END, IT'S A CHOOSE YOUR OWN ADVENTURE!

**Thanks for the reviews**

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"Sakura! Hinata! Tenten!" the blond kunoichi ran up to her three friends, who were headed to the Hokage's office.

"Hello Ino-chan" Hinata smiled politely.

"Hi Ino." Tenten followed suit.

"Hey Ino, what's up?" Sakura asked her friend.

"Great news!" Ino excitedly exclaimed, "We're having a festival!" she told them.

"But we just had a festival three months ago." Tenten pointed out. She was never really one for festivals; they usually required getting all dressed up in kimonos; something she rarely liked to do.

"Are you sure?" Sakura asked, ignoring Tenten's obvious dislike of the news.

"Well, my family's flower shop got an order from the Hokage herself, to stock up on more flowers." Ino explained.

"Flowers?" Hinata questioned.

"Yeah, it's going to be a flower festival." Ino smiled triumphantly; proud of herself for being the first of her friends to know about the festival. Technically she only found out about it because her family owned a flower shop, but... _A win's a win._ She told herself smugly.

"Do you think maybe that's why we're being summoned to her office?" Tenten asked the three other girls.

"Probably." Sakura replied, as they all made their way to the Hokage's office.

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"You're cheating!" Jiraiya yelled out.

He was standing across from Tsunade in her office.

"I never cheat!" Tsunade replied with an offended expression on her face.

"Oh yeah? Since when does the village hold a flower festival near the _end_ of spring?" Jiraiya asked accusingly.

"I thought it would be a nice moral boost for our over worked shinobi and the villagers." Tsunade responded.

"Right, so this has nothing to do with festival's being the perfect setting for a romantic encounter?" Jiraiya reproached.

"Oh, are they?" Tsunade smiled innocently.

"You know damn well they are!" Jiraiya shouted. "I use them in my books all the time!" he exclaimed.

"Well then, this should make our bet a little more interesting, shouldn't it?" Her false innocent expression replaced by a mischievous smirk.

"Damn you woman. I knew it! You are cheating!" Jiraiya huffed.

A soft knock at the door stopped the two sannin from continuing their argument.

"Come in." Tsunade ordered.

In walked Shizune, accompanied by four kunoichi.

"You sent for us?" Sakura asked for the four.

"Oh yes." Tsunade shook her head, "Have any of you heard about the festival?" she asked

"Hai!" Ino replied. The other three girls also nodded their heads to indicate that they knew about it as well.

"Good, then I don't have to tell you we're going to need a lot of help making this happen in three days." Tsunade replied.

"Three days?!" All four kunoichi shouted in unison.

"Why the rush?" Jiraiya demanded, though he knew all to well why.

"I'm going to need you four girls to recruit other villagers to help set everything up." Tsunade said, ignoring Jiraiya's question. "Shizune has a list of everything you'll need to do." She said before dismissing them.

"This isn't going to work." Jiraiya warned.

"We'll see." Tsunade smiled wickedly.

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"So how many times does that make it?" Kurenai asked.

"Three times this week." Shizune replied.

The two kunoichi were meeting up to go kimono shopping with Anko and Itsu. As they walked to the shopping center, Shizune had been telling Kurenai about the latest break-in in the Hokage's office.

"And there's still no clue as to who could have done it?" Kurenai asked.

"Nothing. We don't even know what, whoever it is, is looking for." Shizune replied.

"What are you guy's talking about?" a somewhat masculine female voice asked from behind them.

"Oh hey there Anko. Itsu." Kurenai greeted the two other kunoichi.

"Hello." Shizune smiled politely, greeting the two women.

"Hi." Itsu smiled, greeting both women.

"Hey." Anko nodded her head, "So what were you talking about?" she asked again.

"The break-ins into the Hokage's office." Shizune explained, "We're still not sure who's responsible, or what they're looking for."

"But nothing's been taken, though, right?" Itsu asked.

"Nothing." Shizune replied, "It doesn't even seem like anything's been moved."

"That's so weird." Anko replied, "I can't believe someone could get past all the security."

"Yeah." The others agreed.

"HELLO BEAUTIFUL FLOWERS OF YOUTH!" a booming voice came towards them.

"Hello Gai." Itsu smiled at her goofy friend.

Behind him, Genma, Asuma, and Kakashi stood in slight embarrassment at their eccentric friend's behavior, as he bounced over to the four women and gave them all giant bear hugs. After Gai's 'youthful' greeting, the three other shinobi also greeted the kunoichi.

"So what are you girls doing today?" Asuma asked the four, though he was primarily addressing Kurenai.

"Looking for kimono's for the festival, big guy." Anko seductively smiled at the tall man, much to the obvious displeasure of her friend.

"Anko!" Itsu quietly scolded the younger kunoichi. "So what are you guy's doing?" she asked the men.

"Nothing much." Genma replied, "Between this whole festival, and finding out who's responsible for the break-ins in the Hokage's office, we're all pretty much… stranded."

"So you guy's aren't getting any missions either then." Kurenai deduced.

"None. It's so boring." Asuma flicked the end of his cigarette.

"I think this festival might be fun." Shizune offered.

"OH IT WILL! IT WILL BE THE PERFECT WAY TO EXPRESS OUR YOUTHFUL LOVE OF LIFE." Gai enthusiastically cheered.

"And flowers." Itsu added, smiling at her friend's eagerness.

"We should probably get going." Kurenai suggested, "We still have to help out with the decorating after we buy our kimono's for the festival" she explained.

After they had all said their good-bye's and began walking to their assigned destination. Kakashi turned back around.

"Itsu." Kakashi called out.

"Yeah?" she asked, turning to face the masked man.

"Would you go to the festival with me?" he asked nervously.

Everyone else stood watching the two; eagerly awaited her reply.

"I'd love to." She replied, feeling somewhat hesitant, but wanting very much to go with him.

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"That's not fair!" Jiraiya shouted at Tsunade, who was grinning evilly in her chair; in front of her was a box filled to the brim with small pieces of paper.

"Are you scared?" Tsunade smirked.

"NO!" Jiraiya replied, "Why should I be scare, you NEVER win."

"HEY!" Tsunade yelled.

"Umm… Granny-Tsunade?" a blond head poked through from behind the slightly open door.

"What do you want Naruto?" Tsunade asked agitatedly.

"We're done setting everything up for tomorrow." Naruto replied.

"Good. Thank you Naruto." She dismissed him.

"This isn't going to work." Jiraiya exclaimed after the boy had left.

"I wouldn't be so sure about that." Tsunade replied.

"Cheater's never win." Jiraiya stated.

"Since when did _**you**_, of all people, become so 'holier-then-thou'?" Tsunade asked.

"Since when did you become such a huge cheater?" Jiraiya asked.

"I'm not cheating." Tsunade replied.

"Oh, no?" Jiraiya questioned, "Then what _**do**_ you call it when you stuff a ballot box?"

"Oh that." Tsunade smiled sheepishly, "Well, I'm not exactly stuffing it for me to win, so it's not really cheating." She rationalized.

"No, you're stuffing it so that Kakashi and Itsu win, which means they'd have to ride the rose heart float, which means they might kiss, which means you'd win OUR bet." He hurriedly said.

"What's your point?" she asked.

"That's cheating!" he accused.

"Are you scared?" she smirked challengingly.

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**A/N:** ok… I got another chapter out… for some reason my alerts from fanfiction aren't working or something… anyway… I have a few idea's for what I'm going to do with the story, but I'm not 100 percent yet… so, we're going to play a game… it's a CHOSE YOUR OWN ADVENTURE type thing (remember those books? I loved them when I was growing up). Anywho… if you want to be surprised with the story, STOP READING HERE!... for anyone else interested in helping me decided what to do, here's some options.

So far, the story lines that are still hanging are:

(1). Obviously the whole Itsu remembering Kakashi and the running bet that the village has… but I already know (sort of) what I'm going to do there.

(2). Whose breaking into the Hokage's office.

I have a few ideas on what I'm going to do here. Initially I was going to have Itsu be the one breaking into the office, but I wasn't sure why exactly. Either:  
**a**. I was going to have her be working for some enemy, but that doesn't really make sense with her remembering how she ended up back in the village (looking into Sasuke's mind and seeing something she recognized).  
**b.** I also thought of having her search through the office to find out what they were hiding from her, which seemed the most logically thing, but then I had to come up with something for them to be hiding, which I thought  
_1. the betting pools (but that's kind of simple and a little lame)  
__2. the fact that Kakashi and she are married (but again, simple and lame)  
__3. then I thought, what if Kakashi and she had a son who was also killed in the Uchiha massacre? (can you tell I love soap opera-ish drama?... lol)… and this one is still kind of up in the air… it sounds do-able, but I don't know. It would explain Itsu's trauma, and Kakashi's a little crazy anyway (it's an ANBU prerequisite right?... lol), so it could work, but then I don't know if I want that much angst in this story.  
4. another option for Itsu breaking into the Hokage's office could be that she's a wanted criminal, from her life after she disappeared, which would make prefect sense with how I've already set some of the flashback's up… and it could work, but then how will I get my happily ever after?... then again, I've always been partial to killing off my protagonist (The martyr in me… lol). So we'll see._

**c.** My final option was to have some enemy (from her life away from the village) who is coming in to kill Itsu, be the one breaking into the Hokage's office. But then I'm not sure if that really works either, because I'd have to explain why this enemy didn't just take her out already… it's do-able, but… might be challenging…

Anyway… those are my options.. What do you think? Is there anything else I'm missing… oh the Sasuke stuff… well I'm not sure what I'm going to do with that just yet, but I'll be throwing in a bit of that every so often…


	14. Marionettes

**Disclaimer**: I don't own Naruto

**Chapter summary**: The festival part 1. A challenge, hidden truths, and marionettes.

**Thanks for the reviews ;D**

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(Kakashi's POV… sort of)

The day of the festival had started out rather well; the sun was shinning brilliantly over head, as the villagers began visiting the booths that colorfully lined the main streets of Konoha. Though it had been last minute, everyone had turned out for the event. The brightly colored booths were successfully selling handmade crafts, as well a supplying a variety of food, games, activities, and most of all, flowers. The Yamanaka flower shop was having a great day, having set up five different booths for the festivities, all of them selling lots of flowers.

"Wow." Itsu stood in awe before the rows of booths, surprised at how beautiful everything had been put together within just a few days.

"It seems like everyone really put a lot of effort into this flower festival." Kakashi remarked.

"Tsunade-sama really seems to have spared no expense." Itsu replied.

"Yeah." Kakashi agreed, "So what do you want to try first?" he asked, feeling as eager as a child.

"You pick." She replied, smiling widely, at seeing the enthusiasm in his eye.

"Okay." Kakashi pulled her towards the booth closest to them.

There was something in the air, perhaps it was the festival, but Kakashi felt exhilarated. The smell of flowers permeated the air; mixing in with the delicious smells of the various festival food. But it wasn't the smells, or the sounds, or even the colorful decorations; it was the fact that he was here with Itsu. They'd had a few dates since her return, thanks in part to Gai's constant insistence that he embrace the "youthful love" the two shared, but this was different; it was almost as if there was electricity in the air.

Though he had eventually relented to Gai's continuing pestering, Kakashi had been reluctant to try wooing Itsu over again before her memory returned. This was not because he didn't want to be by her side, but rather because Tsunade had warned him that if she remembered too much too quickly it could do more damage than good.

Itsu's memory problems had been a definite concern, but in a way, Kakashi almost saw it as a blessing in disguise. As a shinobi, Kakashi had been witness to many painful and nearly unbearable sights. He had lost many people he cared about, and the memory of those tragedies that he carried deep within his heart, tugged at his soul, tearing him up inside. When Itsu had disappeared during the Uchiha massacre, it had nearly driven him insane. He had lost everything on that day. The pain had been so fiercely immense; he had nearly been on the verge of taking his own life. Had it not been for the experience of witnessing his own father's seppuku, and the intervention of both Gai and Jiraiya, he might have gone through with it. Instead, he closed himself off from the world; burying himself into those books he enjoyed, forgetting about his own reality. (A/N: Seppuku is a Japanese ritual suicide).

"SO IT'S SETTLED, I'LL WRITE YOU TWO IN FOR PRINCE AND PRINCESS OF THE FLOWER FESTIVAL!" Gai exclaimed.

"Huh? Did you say something?" Kakashi asked, having been lost in thought. Beside him, a blushing Itsu tried to suppress a giggle.

"DAMN YOU KAKASHI, ALWAYS WITH THAT 'TOO COOL FOR SCHOOL' ATTITUDE!" Gai exclaimed.

"Not today Gai." Kakashi replied nonchalantly, believing that the spandex wearing jonin had challenged him to yet another battle. "I'm a little busy right now."

"WE HAVE 53 EVEN MATCHES," Gai began, "BUT THAT IS NOT WHAT I WAS TALKING ABOUT." Gai clarified.

"Oh?" Kakashi wondered.

"But perhaps we should battle." Gai said thoughtfully, "YES! WE WILL TURN THIS INTO A MATCH. WE WILL SEE WHICH ONE OF US WINS FOR PRINCE OF THE FLOWER FESTIVAL!" Gai exclaimed loudly, causing other festival goers to turn and look at the trio. "I SHALL NOT BE DEFEATED!" he yelled out as he ran off to put his name in for the competition.

"Prince of the flower festival?" Kakashi repeated; confused as to what had just happened.

"Why is it that you never seem to hear everything he says?" Itsu asked with a smirk on her face.

"Um..." Kakashi sheepishly scratched his head, "I find it's easier to be friends with him when you don't listen to half of the 'youthful' things he says." He replied.

"…" She was about to say something, when she started giggling instead. "I used to tone him out and imagine what he would look like in a different outfit and haircut." She confessed.

"…" Kakashi stared at her for a moment and then burst out laughing, once more garnering the attention of those around them.

"I think my favorite was imagining him in a clown outfit, with an colorful afro, and big floppy shoes." This made both of them burst out in a fit of laughter.

"S-So…" Kakashi tried to steady his voice from all the laughter, "What was it he challenged me to this time?" he asked.

"Oh." A light blush crossed her face, "he was talking about how that booth over there" she pointed to a golden colored booth "is collecting nominations to see who will be crowned Prince and Princess of the Flower Festival."

"Okay." Kakashi looked over at the shiny booth. "And...?"

"And… well he suggested that he nominate you and me, and that's when I think you started listening." She explained.

"Oh." Kakashi replied, now understanding what the blush on Itsu's face earlier had been about. "So, now he wants to compete to see which one of us will be Prince?" he asked.

"Hai." Itsu nodded her head.

"Okay." Kakashi sighed, "lets go nominate ourselves." He said, leading them both to the golden booth where the nominations would be taking place.

"Hey Kakashi-sensei, hello Itsu-chan" Naruto greeted the two as they approached the booth.

"Hi Naruto, what are you doing here?" Kakashi asked. "I thought you were supposed to be in the marionette booth with Konohamaru."

He shuttered at the thought, whoever decided Naruto and the third's grandson would be good puppeteers obviously didn't realize how bad Naruto was with chakra strings. It would have been a much better idea to place Tenten, who already used chakra strings with her weapons, or Sakura who was excellent at chakra control. However, Tenten had been sent to man the dunk tank with Neji, and Sakura was in charge of first aid. Still, anyone would have been better then Naruto.

"Oh, granny Tsunade asked me to watch the booth while she went to get something." Naruto explained, "But Konohamaru is still running the booth with Lee."

Kakashi stared in amazement at this. As if Naruto hadn't been a bad enough choice; Lee didn't even use chakra! Someone was obviously having a fun time assigning some of the booths, or perhaps it was because everything was last minute. One thing he was sure of, the marionette booth was certainly going to be interestingly comical.

"So who are you nominating?" Naruto finally asked.

"We're nominating ourselves." Kakashi replied, wondering if Naruto would be back to his assigned booth; maybe he and Itsu would go check it out.

"Oh, I've already got you two nominated; a couple of times actually. Do you want to nominate someone else?" Naruto asked.

"How about Gai? Has he been nominated?" Itsu asked from beside Kakashi.

"Yeah, he just nominated himself a few minutes ago; and Lee nominated him right before he went to cover my booth." Naruto replied.

"Is that so… So Naruto, tell me, when does the voting start?" Kakashi asked; eager to get this competition over.

"Well, the nominations are over in a few minutes, and then after that, I have to write out the ballots." Naruto explained, "Then everyone votes, and whoever wins gets to ride the Rose Float."

"What's the 'Rose Float'?" Itsu wondered.

"Oh that's this huge float I made the other day! Its made of all kinds of roses." Naruto proudly stated.

"YOU made?" Kakashi asked, surprised.

"Yeah!" Naruto excited replied. (A/N: I ALMOST wrote 'Believe it!"… lol… but I resisted).

"All by yourself?" Itsu asked, also very surprised by this information.

"Well, I used my shadow clones." Naruto explained; to which Kakashi and Itsu nodded their heads, understanding now what he meant.

"I CERTAINLY HOPE YOU DID A YOUTHFULLY GOOD JOB OF IT." A voice from behind the two jonin said, "BECAUSE GAI-SENSEI WILL BE RIDING THAT FLOAT!" Lee exclaimed as he approached the booth.

"We'll see about that! Kakashi-sensei already has fifty nominations!" Naruto exclaimed.

Over the years, as Gai and Kakashi's students had learned of their 'rivalry', Naruto and Lee had become just as enthusiastic about their competitions as Gai was. In every competition of challenge, the two young shinobi would fiercely argue about whose sensei was better, and who would beat who.

"Ah, Lee?" Kakashi interrupted the young boys' banter.

"Yes?" Lee replied.

"Aren't you supposed to be handling the marionette booth?" Itsu asked, knowing what Kakashi was about to say.

"Gai-sensei took over for me. I'm going to go around and get everyone to vote for him." Lee explained enthusiastically.

"Gai…" Kakashi's eye twitched, as he found himself at a loss for words.

"We HAVE to see the marionettes!" Itsu excitedly said, a wide grin spread on her face.

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(Jiraiya's POV)

"I don't think so!" Jiraiya snatched the large box from Tsunade's hands.

"What do you think you're doing?" Tsunade yelled, trying to reach the box, as Jiraiya held it over her head.

"What do I think I'm doing? What do YOU think you're doing?" Jiraiya exclaimed, "You're the Hokage, for Kami's sake! You should know better then to cheat. It's a very bad example."

"You're right, I _**am**_ the Hokage! Now give me that back!" Tsunade punch the man in the stomach. Not with her full strength, but enough to knock the wind out of him, and cause him to drop the box, which she quickly grabbed and began walking back towards the booth where she'd left Naruto.

"Tsunade!" Jiraiya hissed, as he picked himself up and ran over to catch the sneaky woman.

"I don't see what your problem is Jiraiya." Tsunade huffed, as she cradled the box closer to her body, to keep the white haired sannin away from it. "Either way, you win. If my plan fails, you win our little side bet; and if it works, Kakashi's kiss might help Itsu get all her memories back, and you'll be happy because you'll no longer have to tiptoe around her."

"Weren't you the one who said she should remember when she's ready to remember?" Jiraiya retorted.

"Itsu's a strong woman. She can handle whatever traumatic memories she has buried in her mind." Tsunade replied, though even she wasn't completely convinced of the words that left her mouth. "Besides, the sooner she remembers, the sooner she can begin to heal." She added.

"We don't even know what she went through." Jiraiya replied solemnly.

There was a lot about that fateful night, when Itsu disappeared, that everyone was still unsure of. At the time, they had believed she'd been killed, along with all the other Uchiha's, but her body had never been found, leaving many unanswered questions. And now that she was back, those questions resurfaced, along with many others. What had she seen? There were many possibilities; some too tragic and terrifying to believe. For that reason, Jiraiya almost wished his daughter _**wouldn't**_ remember. She had already remembered enough to know that she was home; couldn't that be enough?

"I understand that you want to protect her." Tsunade replied. "But the memories are still there, buried in her subconscious. Just because she doesn't remember doesn't mean that they aren't causing her harm."

"She might not ever remember." Jiraiya replied.

"If that happens, we'll never know what happened. And how can we help her heal, if we don't know what she has to heal from?" Tsunade pointed out.

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(Kakashi's POV)

Kakashi watched as Itsu sat to the side of the marionette stage. It had been elaborately constructed with red velvet curtains and oak panels, stained in a deep maroon, with golden leaves carved into the wood. Behind the box, the voices of Gai, Konohamaru and Naruto could be heard. Naruto had arrived only moment's after Kakashi and Itsu had finally located the marionette booth; though it wasn't really a booth so much as it was a large open space at the edge of the forest, right where the lined booths ended.

As the skit before them played out, Kakashi watched Itsu lean forwards on her arms, which were bent upwards cupping her faces; her elbows on her knees. She seemed angelic to him, in her light lavender kimono, which shimmered in the sunlight's rays. He watched as her expression changed throughout the play; laughing at all the funny parts, chewing on her lower lip at the suspenseful parts, and scrunching her nose and brow at the confusing or disturbing parts.

At the moment, an expression of both amusement and concern swept across her face. Kakashi hadn't been paying attention to the skit, so he wondered what exactly it was that she was reacting to.

"NARUTO! You're stepping on my foot!" a voice came from behind the velvet curtain.

"No, I'm not! YOU'RE stepping on my HAND, Konohamaru-chan!" Naruto's voice came from behind the curtain.

"BOTH OF YOU, IT IS MOST UNYOUTHFUL TO BREAK CHARACTER IN THE MIDDLE OF A PLAY!" Gai shouted at the two boys.

"That fool." Kakashi mumbled under his breath, smirking behind his mask.

The children sitting in front of the marionette stage began to murmur and fidget around, as the voices behind the curtain continued to bicker, and the marionettes were long forgotten. The box which formed the stage was about four feet wide and three feet tall; hardly enough room for two children and one grown man to fit inside. Perhaps it had been enough room for Naruto and Konohamaru to fit in, though still somewhat snuggly, but with the youth obsessed jonin also joining them, it would definitely be cramped.

Giggling beside him brought Kakashi out of his musings. "What's so funny?" he asked.

"I can't imagine how Gai fits in that small box." Itsu replied; having obviously been thinking the same thing as Kakashi.

"You're talking about a man who believes it's possible to run 500 laps around the village on his hands." Kakashi smirked at the memory of the countless times that he had been witness to Gai's attempts to circle the village on his hands, resulting in many instances of bruised and bloody palms.

"You're right." She laughed, "even if it were two feet tall and wide, he'd still squeeze himself in there; if only to prove that he could."

"Well, he's always entertaining." Kakashi chuckled, as he watched the box jump up and down from the commotion inside.

The small crowd of children and their parents had quickly begun to disperse. In moments, only Kakashi and Itsu were left watching, or rather, hearing the antics of the three behind the curtain.

"I love marionettes." Itsu stated, as she walked over to the small stage and picked up one of the puppets that had fallen off the stage.

"I know." Kakashi replied; a hint of sorrow lingered in his tone.

"I don't remember why, though." She said pensively.

"No. You wouldn't…" Kakashi mumbled; low enough for Itsu not to hear, "Not yet…"

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**A/N:** I wanted to finish the whole festival scene in one chapter, but… it's getting late, and I guess that's not going to happen. Anyway… I'm sorry it took me a while to update; life got in the way… hopefully I'll be able to finish the festival stuff in the next chapter and finish the story soon. School's going to be starting in a few weeks and I don't know how much time I'll have to write after that happens. I already got my syllabus for one class, and I'll probably be starting my assignments for the first week of school within the next week or so (as soon as I get my reading list in the mail). Anyway, I hope you like this chapter, thanks Kiri Yumiko, babygurl1012, RyaneNight92, and PhantomGirl94, for the reviews and the suggestions, your feedback was very helpful. I have plenty of ideas and now that I've gotten over my writers block slump, hopefully I'll be able to update sooner. **:D **

Hehehe… can you spot the hidden clues as to which option I decided to go with:P


	15. Paper Shuriken

**Disclaimer**: I don't own Naruto

**Chapter summary**: The festival part 2. Nothing but Fluff. No, not really… there's some fluff, but mostly pre-angst and a funny "fight", or at least I hope it's funny.

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The announcement was made by the Hokage herself; Kakashi and Itsu had won for Prince and Princess of the flower festival. As a prize, they were given seats on the rose float that Naruto had help build, days earlier. The evening was beginning to darken, as the sun began setting over the horizon. The sky was tinted in brilliant shades of crimson, gold, and lavender.

As the closing ceremony parade prepared to commence, the villagers lined the streets, standing in front of the now, mostly empty, colorful booths. There were a number of small floats, all made by academy students and some villagers, days earlier. In front of the floats, were various performers, musical groups, and academy students performing taijutsu and ninjutsu techniques they learned in the academy, but in an artistic sort of performance; almost like a dance.

"Those children are amazing." Itsu exclaimed, as she watched the group of children executing a taijutsu performance in front of their float.

"Hn." Kakashi grunted; though, as he looked forward to the group of academy students Itsu had mentioned, he did agree their dance looked rather well done.

"How old are they?" Itsu wondered.

"…" having turned back to face Itsu, Kakashi wondered what could possibly be going through her mind before turning back to look at the children. "They look to be around eight." He replied solemnly.

"What's wrong?" Itsu asked, having noticed the sorrowful tone in his voice.

"What makes you think something's wrong?" Kakashi asked, trying to shake off the gloom in his voice.

"You just…" Itsu began. "Never mind." She said, turning her attention back to the parade in progress.

Their float, which had been surprisingly well constructed and beautifully built, began moving, after the performers finished their routine.

"Hey look," Itsu motioned for Kakashi to look into the crowd. "It's Gai and his students." She said.

Among the crowd of those watching the parade, Gai, Lee, Neji and Tenten stood watching the parade. Beside Lee, Naruto stood with Sasuke and Sakura. Surprisingly, Gai didn't seem the least bit upset that he had lost another match to Kakashi.

"KAKASHI! ITSU!" Gai waved from the crowd. "CONGRATULATIONS MY YOUTHFUL FRIENDS!" Even with the loud crowds and the noisy parade, his voice still carried over to the pair on the moving red rose float.

Itsu smiled as she waved back to Gai, and the rest of the crowd, who cheered as the large red float slowly passed by them. Suddenly Itsu stop waving and turned to face Kakashi. "Does something smell funny?" she asked, crinkling her nose as she tied to figure out what it was she was smelling.

"I was thinking the same thing." Kakashi replied, "it smells like roses, but… stronger and kind of… bitter." He tired smelling through his mask.

"Like burning rose petals." Itsu offered.

"Exactly. Wait…" Kakashi and Itsu turned to look at their float, wondering if perhaps the roses had caught on fire, but there was no visible flame.

Suddenly the engine seemed to lose control, as the float began speeding up. The cheering crowd noticed the out of control float, and began panicking; running to get out of the way. Some Shinobi intercepted the float's path and moved civilians out of harms way, as Kakashi and Itsu tried to regain control of the float by steering it out of the way, to avoid hitting any villagers. However the controls were hidden beneath the layers and layers of roses that Naruto had packed on top of the small vehicle that carried the float.

"That's it!" Kakashi exclaimed having realized how they could stop the run away float, "NARUTO!" he yelled out, "USE YOUR SHADOW CLONES TO CREATE A BARRICADE!" he instructed. "That might stop us." He said, as he turned to Itsu.

Having learned to mimic Naruto's shadow clone jutsu, Kakashi joined Naruto with his own clones, and created a human barricade, successfully blocking the float and diverting it towards one of the booths, which effectively put a stop to the float. The only problem was that that booth which happened to stop the float was the one in which the pie eating contest had been held. Since the Akimichi clan had been busy manning their own booth, they had been unable to participate in the contest, which had left more than a hundred pies left over from the competition. Of those pies, dozens went soaring through the air as the float hit the booth with full force. The flying pies landed, scattered through the area, hitting dozen's of surprised villagers; shinobi and civilian alike.

"Sasuke-teme…" Naruto broke out laughing. So much so, he fell down on the floor, rolling hysterically on the ground.

Having had his pride insulted, Sasuke allowed his anger to over take him, and he picked up a pie that landed near him, throwing it in Naruto's direction. However, Naruto, having picked himself up from the floor, quickly ducked back down, barely missing the pie flying towards him. Instead, Sasuke's pie hit Tenten square in the face. Of course, this only served to make Tenten very angry, and with her 100 percent accuracy, she retaliated, sending another pie soaring towards Sasuke. Sasuke knew that he would get hit again, so he used a replacement jutsu to avoid the second pie, but in doing so, he managed only to replace himself with the nearest available object, which just so happened to be another pie. The first pie hit the second pie, but didn't stop, and instead hit Sakura, who had been standing behind Sasuke. Upon seeing this, Ino began laughing at her pink haired friend, while Shikamaru decided that it was the best time to sneak away, realizing what would happen next. As soon as Sakura walked over to the pie booth, which still held dozens of untouched pies, she picked one up and through it at Ino's head.

Deciding it would be fun to join in, Kiba shouted "PIE FIGHT!" and the entire village began, what would certainly be remembered as the largest food fight in the village's history, if not the entire fire country.

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"T-that…" Itsu tried to control her voice, but failed to do so, due to the fact that she couldn't stop laughing.

"Yeah." Kakashi agreed, knowing what Itsu had been trying to say through the laughter.

He too couldn't help but laugh at the antics of the villagers, as the entire Leaf population threw creamy pies at one another. As Kakashi and Itsu tired dodging pie after pie, Kakashi had managed to pull her out of the pandemonium, but not before they had both been covered in pie. After the two escaped into the woods, Kakashi walked them towards the river that ran through the forest.

"I can't believe that just happened." Itsu finally managed to say, after controlling her laughter.

"It _was_ quite a sight." Kakashi agreed, as the two reached the river's edge and began washing off the pie from their hair and clothes.

"There's going to be a lot of cleaning to do tomorrow." Itsu stated, somewhat amused by the thought, though quite frightful of the prospect of having to be part of the clean up.

"Well we could always get Naruto to clean it up." Kakashi suggested, as he removed his mask to wash it as well.

"Well he is mostly responsible, having been the one who stuffed the engine with roses." Itsu replied, chuckling at the thought of Naruto's absentmindedness.

Behind her, Kakashi watched as Itsu distractedly began to remove her kimono, leaving her in nothing but her white Nagajuban. Had he been wearing his mask, his blush would have been unnoticeable, but since at the moment, he was holding onto the aforementioned mask in his right hand, the bright shade of red that encompassed his face was clearly visible. (A/N: A Nagajuban is a sort of white robe worn underneath the Kimono, which serves as a kind of underwear).

"Hey, you're not wearing your mask." Itsu exclaimed, as she turned around to face the silver haired shinobi.

"Well, I got pie all over it." He explained, grateful that he had managed to suppress his blush before she had turned around to face him. "I figured I'd wash it off in the river."

"I thought you never took it off." Itsu replied, as she moved closer to the copy-nin, trying to get a better look at him in the darkness. "They told me you never show your face to anyone." She whispered, though not quite certain as to why.

"I usually don't." Kakashi confirmed, "but you've seen it before." He whispered back.

"I have?" she asked; a sultry tone to her voice, as she moved closer to see his face more clearly.

"Yes." Kakashi replied, in a husky voice.

The two moved slowly in the moonlight, approaching the other, until they were mere inches apart. Their breath grew heavy, as the heat between them increased. Slowly, their lips touched for what felt like the first time, though Kakashi knew better; still he felt as he did the very first time he kissed her. A jolt of electricity surged through his body at first contact. But no sooner had their lips tenderly met, when a loud explosion startled the pair, and Itsu stumbled backwards into the mud along side the river bank.

In the sky, dozens of fireworks exploded in a multitude of colors. Realizing what the noise that had spooked her was, Itsu began laughing at her current muddied state. Kakashi soon joined her, finding the whole thing hilarious as well. He had gotten his kiss, and though it had lasted no more than a fraction of a second, it was a memory he was sure to cherish; seeing his beloved wife on the floor, covered in mud, after having been surprised by the unexpected firework display.

He bent down to offer her his hand, and she willingly took it, but just as she began to rise to her feet, she turned to face the water. The display in the sky seemed to give the river a deep red glow. A look of terror spread across her face, as if something dark had suddenly entered into her mind.

"What's wrong?" Kakashi asked, as he helped her to get up.

"I saw something." Itsu said; a slight tremor to her voice.

"What?" Kakashi asked nervously.

"I don't know." She began, "I think it was a memory." She appeared to be thinking, "but it doesn't make any sense." She finally said.

"What did you see?" Kakashi worriedly asked, wondering what it could be that she may have remembered.

"I'm not sure." She replied, "But you remember the story I told you about how I woke up in the river when I lost my memory?"

"Hai." Kakashi replied. Of course he remembered, it had even given him nightmares to image what could have happened before that.

"I saw…" she began, "a shuriken." She simply stated.

"A shuriken?" Kakashi questioned, "How is that…?" he wasn't sure what she meant, since she had already told him that the day she come out of the river she'd been surrounded by various weapon's including shurikens. What made this one special?

"It wasn't real though." She explained.

"What do you mean?" Now he was really confused.

"It was made of paper." She said.

"Paper?" he repeated. He could only think of one thing that could possibly mean, but he didn't dare put his thoughts into words. "I think we should be getting back to the village." He said, trying to keep her from thinking more about the paper shuriken.

"Okay." She replied, as the two began picking up their belongings. Kakashi put his mask back on, while Itsu draped her soiled kimono back on, over her muddy nagajuban.

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A/N: I was considering making it another "near-kiss" moment, or having them kiss really passionately during the fireworks display, but then I decided to use the location of the river to further my plotline. Anywho, looks like the angsty stuff is coming up soon. I hope you enjoyed the chapter. :D

Oh, and I tired to make the "pie fight" kind of funny, but, I don't know if that was all that successful. Really I just needed that as an excuse to get Kakashi and Itsu away from everyone and to the river, so it worked out well enough.


	16. A Truth Revealed

**Disclaimer**: I don't own Naruto

**Chapter summary**: some Genma love, and then a truth revealed.

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(Sasuke's POV)

"So you're going to be training with her?" Naruto asked, referring of course to Itsu.

"Yeah." Sasuke replied.

They were sitting at the Ichiraku Ramen stand with Neji and Lee. Naruto had invited the boys of Team Gai to join him and Sasuke for lunch, in an effort to get Sasuke to socialize more with other people. Lee had readily agreed, believing it was his moral obligation to bring youth and friendship to the gloomy Uchiha. Neji, on the other hand, having always disliked Sasuke, had been reluctant to join them; however, Lee refused to take 'No' for an answer, and had dragged the white eyed prodigy, who eventually relented.

"THAT IS MOST YOUTHFUL OF YOU!" Lee exclaimed from his seat next to Naruto. "ITSU-CHAN IS A MOST TALENTED KUNOICHI." He added. "AM I NOT RIGHT, NEJI-SAN?" he asked his white eyed friend.

"Hn." Neji grunted. Of course, he did agree; Itsu had been training with Team Gai, and while she claimed her taijutsu skills were not her greatest strength, she could hardly be considered weak.

"Plus, there's the fact that she's an Uchiha, which means she should be able to help you train with your sharingan." Naruto stated, surprising everyone present with how insightful that was.

Naruto's assessment, however startling it was to hear from him, was actually exactly the reason why Sasuke had asked Itsu to train him. While Sasuke had been missing, he had worked on ninjutsu, taijutsu, and some genjutsu, but since the sharingan was an ability only present in the Uchiha clan, the only training he had ever received for his bloodline limit had been with his father when he was young, and somewhat with Kakashi; but for the most part he'd been training himself to use the ability. Now that he had someone who had mastered the copy wheel eye, he was determined to take full advantage. Discovering that the woman who had brought him back to his village was an Uchiha had been one of the reasons he had decided to not go missing again; the other being that Itachi was likely to come after Naruto again, which made Konoha the best place to find his brother.

"That's true." Neji finally spoke up, "learning to use a bloodline trait is easier when done so from one who had already mastered it." Neji knew this all too well. He had trained himself to use the main house technique to the byakugan for many years, but had not truly begun to master it until he began learning under Hashi.

"Hn." Sasuke replied. Of course he knew that, he didn't need that arrogant bastard to tell him so. (a/n: Sasuke should not insult ones of the authoress' favorite character, he will pay.. lol)

"Hey look!" Naruto yelled out, "here she comes." He pointed over to where Itsu was walking with Genma.

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"You fell in the mud?" Genma snickered.

"Don't laugh!" Itsu playfully smacked her friend on the shoulder.

"I can't help it." he said, through chuckles. "I can just imagine you on the ground, your kimono caked in mud. hahaha." He laughed.

Itsu had conveniently left out the part that she had been in nothing but her nagajuban, which meant that when she fell into the mud, the white robe had become nearly transparent, clinging itself to her body with the mud.

"And to think, _you_ were frightened by a firecracker." He smirked at the image. "The great Ha-"he stopped himself before he could say it. "Konoha's Silver Enchantress." He shook his head incredulously, hoping she hadn't caught his near slip up.

"Silver Enchantress." She smiled, before quickly snatching the senbon from between his lips. "I haven't heard that in a while." She twirled the senbon between her fingers.

Silver Enchantress had been the nickname she had been graced with. It had been in reference to her hair as well as her ability to capture anyone under her genjutsu spell.

"Give me that back." He tried to grab the senbon from Itsu's hand, but she easily dodged his hand. "Whatever." He sighed, not really feeling up for games at the moment.

"What's wrong? Things with you and Shizune not going so well?" she teased.

"Shut up!" he replied, "Not all of us can have the fairy tale… never mind." He scoffed.

"Well if you quit messing around with Anko and the other women of the village, maybe Shizune wouldn't keep rejecting you." She bluntly stated.

"What can I say…" He smirked, "The Leaf women are just hot for my body."

"Riiiiiight." She rolled her eyes.

"And that Anko…" he began, "the things she can do…"

"Stop right there!" Itsu covered her ears, "I don't want to know."

"Fine, Fine, Fine." He relented. "So anyway, how are things between you and Kakashi going?" he asked, changing the subject, "I mean, other than you falling in the mud in front of him." He teased; payback for her teasing him about Shizune.

"I saw his face." Itsu stated as she handed the senbon back to her old teammate.

"You did?" he questioned.

In the many years he'd known Kakashi, never once had he seen the copy-nin's face. It was well known that the masked shinobi was good at keeping his face hidden, though there had been a few people who had caught glimpses of it; but no one had ever had more than a second or two to really see what he looked like under his mask.

"Yeah." She nodded.

"So what's he look like under the mask?" he asked. He'd asked this very question years ago when Itsu had first seen what Kakashi looked like, but back then he hadn't gotten a clear answer; for some reason, he didn't expect one this time either.

"Well… he's quite handsome." She replied thoughtfully.

"That's what you said last time." He smirked.

"Oh?" she turned to face him, "so I really have seen his face before." As they continued walking, she thought about what this could possibly mean.

"So tell me." Genma began, "Is he better looking than me?" he asked with a cocky grin, before being playfully pushed by Itsu. Unfortunately, he'd been a bit distracted by the blond shinobi waving at them, to realize what she did until he landed face first into a small mud puddle.

"You were right." Itsu laughed, "Falling into mud _is_ funny." She giggled as she began walking away.

"Hey Itsu-chan!" Naruto called out from in front of the Ichiraku Ramen stand.

"Hey Naruto!" Itsu walked over to the small group of shinobi assembled within the ramen stand. "Hello Sasuke, Neji, Lee." She greeted the other boys.

"HELLO ITSU-CHAN!" Lee unnecessarily shouted his greeting. The two other shinobi's merely nodded their heads in acknowledgement.

"I take it Naruto picked where to eat lunch today." She grinned knowingly.

"What gave it away?" Sasuke replied dryly.

"Yeah, you want to join us?" Naruto offered, ignoring Sasuke's attitude.

"Thanks for the offer," Itsu replied, "but Genma and I were on our way to the meet up with some friends for lunch." She motioned over to the special jonin currently getting himself out of the mud. "Maybe next time." She added.

"Oi, come on, we have to move it." Genma states as he approached the group, "I'll be damned if I'm going to get anywhere _after Kakashi_." he added, before the two of them waved their good-byes and began making their way towards the designated restaurant where they were to meet up with their friends.

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(Itsu's POV)

The eight friends sat tightly together at a booth in one of the best barbeque pork restaurant's in the village. They had all agreed to meet on that day for lunch because it had been the only day that none of them had had missions. Most of the teams had been assigned to help clean up the mess from the festival, but with that now finished, missions were set to start up again, so this was the only day the eight of them could fit it into their busy schedules.

"I still can't believe your kid stuffed the engine with roses." Asuma chuckled.

"Yeah, Naruto's not always the sharpest kunai in the bunch, but you have to admit, his float did look pretty damn good." Kakashi said, defending his loudmouth student.

"That's true, it was beautifully made." Kurenai agreed from beside Asuma.

"YOU CAN'T BLAME THE BOY FOR HIS YOUTHFUL ENTHUSIAM." Gai exclaimed in defense of the boy.

As the conversation continued and moved on to other topics, Itsu remained quiet, observing the people around her. Anko and Shizune both sat at opposite sides of Genma, who looked both pleased, yet uncomfortable, being surrounded by both woman he had tried to pursue on different (though not entirely separate) occasions. Beside Shizune, sat the ever entertaining Gai, spouting things about 'youth' and 'springtime' and other such phrases that the remaining seven were all too familiar with.

Sitting on her side of the booth, to her right, was Kurenai, and beside her, Asuma. Just about everyone, including Itsu, suspected those two were secretly dating. They really did make a cute couple, in Itsu's opinion; why they didn't just go for it was beyond anyone's understanding.

And finally, to her left, sitting close enough for her to smell the detergent of his freshly washed mask: Kakashi. So much had happened in the few short weeks since her return. There was still so much that she felt she didn't know; so many questions still hanging in the air, and she was certain this gray haired man had most of the answers.

"Kakashi?" Itsu said in a small voice.

"Huh?" he turned his lazy gaze over to her, while the other's continued in their conversations.

"Were we involved?" she asked. At this, everyone at the table froze; going completely quiet.

"…" Unsure of what to say to this, Kakashi remained silent. He didn't want to lie to her, but he really hadn't expected her to just ask something like that, so he had nothing prepared.

"It's just…" she began, "you were there in the hospital when I woke up; you've been shadowing me almost everywhere; everyone seems to be particularly interested in whether I've remembered you or not; you know everything about me; and when we kissed…"she trailed off, unable to finish her thought.

The other six ninja's sat in complete silence, though knowing smiles and amused looks passed between them. Genma especially seemed amused by this, since he's known how _that_ kiss had ended.

"You haven't completely remembered though, have you?" Kakashi asked, wanting to be certain of just how much she knew.

"No." Itsu shook her head, "but I get this feeling when I'm near you… that there's more…" she said.

"There is." Kakashi replied, with a more serious tone then he was accustomed to using, outside of battles.

"Well…?" She stared the masked shinobi straight in the face, pleading to him with her eyes for some sort of answer.

"Itsu, we're not supposed to…" Shizune began, trying to remind her that she was supposed to remember these things on her own.

"We're married." Kakashi cut in.

"Married?" Itsu repeated.

No one said anything. They merely waited to see what the silver haired kunoichi's reaction would be.

"I wish I could remember." She finally said, as she turned back to face the table, and then leaned her head onto Kakashi's right shoulder.

_So do I._ Kakashi thought. "You will." He assured her.

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**A/N:** Ok, so she knows now. yay! Not exactly how I was picturing she'd find out when I first started writing this, but actually, I really like how it worked out… with all the drama that's coming, it's nice how sweet and simple this revelation was. Anyway… I hope you liked this chapter. I tried working with Point of Views, but to be honest, I don't like writing in first person unless I'm writing about me or my opinions… So much POV stuff is a little rusty, which is why I was trying it out in these last few chapters… not sure if it really worked out that well, as far as POV goes, but I liked the chapters, so, that's all that matters…

I hope you enjoyed my little Genma.x.Itsu scene, I needed to show a little Genma love, he was being forgotten in the story… :P


	17. I Wish I Could Remember

**Disclaimer**: I don't own Naruto

**Chapter summary**: Fluff, Fluff, and more Fluff... well no, not really... some mild fluff at the beginning, followed by a tieing up of a lose end, then some hints and revelations; and then a cliffy... sort of...

**Thanks for the reviews**

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"We're married." No matter how many times she said those two words, it didn't seem to make it any more real for her.

They were now sitting in her small apartment, having separated from their friends to find a more private place to talk.

"Yeah." Kakashi answered, once more.

"Why didn't you tell me?" she turned to him, sitting next to her on the blue couch in her living room.

"I wanted to, but…" Kakashi began.

"You couldn't." she finished for him.

"Yeah." He replied again.

"Is there anything else?" she warily asked.

"…" there was, but Kakashi couldn't say.

"There is." She could see it in his eye, there was something more he knew that she didn't, "but you can't tell me that either, can you?" she asked.

"No." he shook his head.

"I wish I could remember." She solemnly said, turning her gaze to the carpeted floor.

"Me too." He replied quietly.

"Why can't I remember?!" frustration evident in her voice.

"You will." Kakashi tried to reassure her, "You've already remembered a lot." He pointed out.

"I guess." She sighed. "But it seems so unfair."

"What do you mean?" Kakashi asked.

"I look at you…" she began, "and I can feel that there's something really big I'm supposed to remember, and now that I know what it is, it seems so unfair that I can't remember. I mean… we were in love, right?" she pleaded him with her eyes to fill in the holes still left in the story.

"We… Yeah." He replied.

They remained quiet for a while, while Itsu stared at the masked shinobi. Finally she decided to break the silence, "Why didn't you ever remarry?" she asked.

This question surprised him. He hadn't expected something like that. "I couldn't remarry." He replied, unsure of where all of this was heading.

"Well, yeah." She agreed. "We're still married, right? But you didn't know that before." She pointed out.

"That's not what I meant." Kakashi objected.

"Then what?" she asked.

There was a long pause before Kakashi finally decided to answer, "I could never love anyone the way I loved you… the way I love you." he explained.

"Oh." She felt at a loss for words. After all that time that they had been apart, and he still loved her. She wasn't sure how to reply to that. "I wish I could remember." She pushed herself back against the couch, feeling drained and lost.

"You will…" Kakashi pulled her to him, cradling her in his arms.

"When the time is right…?" she repeated what everyone had been telling her the last few weeks.

"When the time is right." He nodded his head gently.

"And until then?" she asked, looking up to face him.

"Until then, I'll be here." He gave her a gentle squeeze to reassure her.

Her right hand tugged down at his mask, pulling it off of him. She extended her head up, and gave him a quick peck on the lips.

"Anything?" he smiled.

"Not yet." She smiled back, snuggling into him. Her memories of him had not yet all returned to her, but she knew what she felt; and in his arms, she felt safe; she felt loved.

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"So who won the betting pools?" Anko asked, eager to know if she'd won anything. After all, it was within the time frame she had bet on.

"I don't think anyone wins." Shizune replied.

"What?!" Anko seemed upset, "Why not?" she demanded.

"Because technically no one bet that she'd figure it out before remembering." Asuma stated.

"Plus Kakashi telling her had never been an option." Kurenai added.

"This sucks!" Anko slammed her fit on the table, "I bet a whole missions pay on that!"

"Be happy you're not Tsunade-sama." Genma smirked, "I heard she made a couple of side bets with Jiraiya."

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"So you're telling me he can use the Mangekyo Sharingan?" Itsu asked.

She and Sasuke had been out in the forest working on his genjutsu for the past few hours and were now taking a short lunch break.

"Why is that so surprising?" Sasuke asked, seeing the look of intrigue on her face.

"It just seems odd." Itsu responded. "You know that there's only one way to attain the Mangekyo right?" he observed him as he put his rice ball down to think.

"Hai." He replied, having been told by Itachi the dark secret of the Mangekyo. "You must kill your best friend." He replied nonchalantly as he removed his blue jacket; a larger version of the one he used to wear in his genin days.

"What?" she gave him a funny look.

"That's what Itachi told me." He replied, wondering why she seemed surprised by this as well.

"N-… Oh." She nodded her head, now understanding. "So that's how."

"How what?" he asked curiously.

"No." she began, "that's not how you get the Mangekyo." She stated. This surprised Sasuke.

"No?" he questioned. "Then… how?"

"You're telling me that he claims to have attained the power of the Mangekyo by killing his best friend?" she asked, ignoring his question.

"Hai." He replied.

"That makes sense…" she whispered thoughtfully to herself.

"It does?" Sasuke was very confused.

He'd always believed what Itachi said, that the Mangekyo was only attainable through the sacrifice of killing ones best friend, but he had been unable to do so, and had decided instead to leave and try some other way. Hearing that that wasn't the only way to attain that level of sharingan gave him a renewed hope he'd long since lost faith in.

"From everything I know of him, Itachi wasn't what you would consider… compassionate." Itsu said.

"No." Sasuke replied._ That's an understatement_ he thought.

"Yet he's been able to attain the Mangekyo sharingan." She restated.

"Hai." He nodded, "but what does that have to do with compassion?" he asked.

"In order to activate the Sharingan, one has to experience a moment of stress or terror, right?" she looked at him for his confirmation.

"That's right." He nodded. It was well known that the sharingan first activated when the user was in need of it; usually when it was life threatening, though not always.

"Well the Mangekyo is only available to us when the user has suffered a great loss." She explained.

"So why did Itachi believe that killing Shisui gave him access to the Mangekyo?" Sasuke asked.

"Simple." She replied thoughtfully, "To suffer from a great loss, one has to first be able to feel compassion for others. Since Itachi did not care about anyone but himself, he had had to create his own loss to attain the Mangekyo, by killing the person closest to him." She explained.

"…" he was beginning to understand. "Kakashi can use the Mangekyo." He stated.

"And considering everything he's been through," she replied, "you can understand why."

"Does that mean that you can use it too?" he asked.

"I can." She confirmed, "And so can you." She added.

"Me?" he questioned.

"You lost your entire clan." She stated, "You've already suffered a great loss."

"If that's true" he began, "why is it that I haven't been able to use it up to now?"

"First," she looked him straight in the eye, "is because you've been so consumed by revenge, you haven't allowed yourself to feel the loss as you should have. And second," her tone softened "you need to know how to use it. Activating the Mangekyo is different from activating your normal sharingan."

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It was the middle of the night in Konoha. The streets were completely abandoned, except for a few sentries, always on duty. A dark shadow quickly leapt from roof to roof, unnoticed by any. The darkness was her ally, as she climbed the walls to the Hokage's mansion, reaching the window to her office.

Itsu scanned the streets once more, hidden in the shadows, out of anyone's sight, as she quietly opened the window to the Hokage's office and slipped in unnoticed. By the light of the moon, she made her way through the office, just as she had many times before. It had been a week since she had returned to the Hokage's office to search through her files. Mostly because there had been extra security, but also because she had been distracted with other stuff to be able to make it back in at night.

When she had first arrived in Konoha, she had been suspicious that perhaps they weren't who they claimed to be, and had snuck in to investigate if they were planning something with her. Once her memory began returning to her, however, she had continued searching through the Hokage's files to figure out what it was she felt they were hiding from her. But there were so many files that until now, she had yet to find whatever it was she was looking for; but today would be the day, she was down the last drawer.

After only a few minutes of searching this time, she came upon a file that looked promising. The tab on the manila folder read _**Uchiha Massacre**._ She hadn't really been looking for anything pertaining to the Uchiha clan, since she had already remembered how distant her relationship to the clan was. Still, she had disappeared on the night of the massacre, so it couldn't hurt to look at the file.

"Itachi… military police… everyone… parents…" she skimmed through the pages, reading a few words out loud every so often, in a hushed whisper, "found dead… Sasuke…"

Then she saw something; her name, and something more after it. She read that piece over and over again. Her hands began trembling as she looked over that piece of the file in disbelief. "No." she whispered softly.

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**A/N:** dun dun dun… lol… of course if you've been reviewing and I've replied already telling you what's coming up… then you already know what this all means… but for those who are just reading, or anyone who didn't read the options in that previous chapter, well then, you might not know… anyway… I hope I've built the suspense up enough… because here comes the angst… and possibly some waterworks… 'tear tear'… I love soap opera-ish drama…


	18. Obito

**Disclaimer**: I don't own Naruto

**Chapter summary**: ANGST! Oh no!...

**Thanks for the reviews ;D **

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"Itachi… military police… everyone… parents…" she skimmed through the pages, reading in a whisper, "found dead… Sasuke…"

Then she saw something; her name, and something more after it. She read that piece over and over again. Her hands began trembling as she looked over that piece of the file in disbelief. "No." she whispered softly.

Suddenly the lights to the office flashed on. "So it _**was**_ you." A strong voice from behind her said knowingly.

She turned to see who it was and found her father standing by the light switch.

"What's wrong?" Jiraiya asked, as she saw the look of distress on her face. He looked down at the file that had fallen to the floor. There were pictures in it scattered at her feet. He caught a glimpse of a picture of a young toddler and knew exactly what had happened.

What started as trembling hands began working its way up her arms and then completely took over the rest of her body; pretty soon her entire body was violently shaking. Tears, that she didn't even know she had in her, began slowly creeping down her face. Suddenly everything turned cold, and the dark night seemed darker.

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----------**FLASHBACK**----------

"Shawinga!" an excited silver haired little boy in a blue mask yelled out. He ran across the small clearing, playing with paper shuriken and a small red lump huddling in a corner of the clearing. (A/N: "Sharingan").

"Don't go too far Obi-chan." Itsu called out to the little boy as he ran to pick up the huddled red lump.

"Listen to your mother Obito." Kakashi called out from beside the river.

Kakashi had just returned from a long mission, and to celebrate his return, Itsu had decided to have a picnic by the river with her family. Wanting to spend more time with his young grandson, Jiraiya, who had been staying in the village for longer and longer stretches of time, in between going off to conduct research for his novels and searching for Orochimaru, had also decided to join them.

"Gwampa, ook wat Gwamakiki cawn du." Obito exclaimed as he picked up the young toad Jiraya had summoned and tired to put him in the water. (A/N: "Grandpa, look what Gamakichi can do." … oh and Gamakichi is one of Jiraiya's toads).

"Obito, Gamakichi is a toad, not a frog; he can't swim." Jiraiya told the boy as he walked up behind him and took the young, scared looking toad from his grandson's hands.

"Ohw. Sawwy gwampa." Obito turned towards the little frog. "Sawwy Gwamakiki. I cwand swim eiwer." He said to the young frog. (A/N: "Oh, sorry grandpa." "Sorry Gamakichi, I can't swim either.")

"He sure is lively today." Kakashi noted as he brought back the fish he had caught in the river.

"He's just excited to see you." She smiled up at him, before taking the fish from him and putting them in the fire she had just set up. "And can you get that mask off of him; it's not fair to deprive a mother of her child's adorable face." She fussed, "or a wife of her husband's handsome face for that matter!" she added as she pulled down Kakashi's mask, while pulling him in for a kiss.

"Fine, fine, fine." He smirked, before giving her another kiss and walking over to the young boy.

----------**END of FLASHBACK**----------

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She found herself in a familiar state to which she had been not too long ago. The bright florescent lights bounced off the blindingly white walls, stinging Itsu's eyes as she opened them to face the ceiling above her. Nothing seemed to physically hurt, but emotionally, she felt like she'd ripped to shreds.

She quickly scanned the room, knowing that she would not be alone. Sitting beside her, just as he had been the last time, Kakashi lay bent over the bed with his head leaning into her. As expected, leaning against the far wall next to the window, though this time wide awake, was Jiraiya.

"Why am I here?" she asked. Not quite remembering what the last thing she did was.

"You fainted." Jiraiya informed her as he approached her bed side.

"Where?" she asked as quietly as possible, not wanting to wake up the sleeping jonin next to her.

"In Tsunade's office." He replied, "but don't worry, no one knows." He added.

"He's dead isn't he?" she looked up to face Jiraiya. She felt afraid of the answer, but she _**needed**_ to know.

"Hai." He nodded solemnly, knowing exactly who she was referring to.

"Is that what I can't remember?" she asked. "Did I see him die?"

"We don't know." Jiraiya replied. "We're not sure what you saw."

"How?" she plead. "We never went to the Uchiha complex. Why would we have been there on **that** day?"

"You weren't." Jiraiya stated.

"No. We weren't." she said thoughtfully, remembering at that moment what had happened. "We were at the river." She began.

----------**FLASHBACK**----------

"Don't splash so much, Obi-chan." Itsu smiled down at her little boy as he tired his best to stay afloat.

They were out in their favorite spot in the forest, at the river bank, teaching little Obito how to swim. Though for his tender age of two he was already considered a true prodigy, he had yet to master swimming. When he had been even younger, he had seen his father walk across water and had tried to follow him, only to sink down into the flowing river. Since that moment, Obito had been reluctant to get back in, even making a fuss each time he had to bathe. Itsu and Kakashi had decided that it was something they had to help him over come before it became a debilitating fear. So on that day, Itsu decided to take Obito out for his first swimming lesson, while his father was away on a mission.

"Mwamy, me wo wike dis." He fidgeted in her arms. (A/N: "Mommy, me no like this.")

"Don't worry, mommy won't let you go until you're ready." She assured him.

They had been out in the river for some time now, and it was beginning to grow dark out. Unbeknownst to both mother and child, a dark figure loomed in the shadows of the forest. Hiding his blood-thirsty chakra well, Itachi slowly approached the last two remaining Uchiha's, save for himself and his younger brother.

In an instant it was over; Itachi approached the pair and immediately went for the child, severely wounding Itsu in the process. The fight that ensued seemed to take an eternity, though it couldn't have been more than a few moments.

Wounded and bleeding out, Itsu didn't stop her attack. She was a mother, and that monster had her child. Animal instinct took over, and she fought with sheer abandon, trying to rescue her child. But the demon in her was no match for demon that was Itachi. He showed no mercy; in fact it seemed as if he relished in the anger he inflicted. Without warning, he threw the boy into the river, knowing he could not yet swim, having been watching the pair for some time.

It didn't take long for her to remove him from the path he blocked to the rivers edge; just long enough for the young boy to drown. As she ran to pick up his lifeless body from the river, she did what no kunoichi should ever do, she let down her guard. If only for an instant, but it was enough. In that moment that she allowed her emotions to cloud her vision and he attacked once more.

----------**END of FLASHBACK**----------

"After that, all I remember is waking up in a river of blood many miles downstream." Itsu finished telling Jiraiya of that horrible night.

"I see." What more could he say? "We never did find him. Or you."

"No. The river probably washed us both down." She replied solemnly. She looked down at Kakashi as he lay resting at her side. "He must have suffered so much." She stated, weaving her hand through his hair.

"He did." Jiraiya confirmed, purposefully leaving out the suicide attempt that Kakashi had tried before he and Gai managed to stop him. "But now he has you back." He gently squeezed her shoulders before making his way out the door to tell the nurses Itsu was awake.

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**A/N:** Well, I liked it. It was as angsty as I would allow myself to get… but I really don't like killing off babies… I kind of left me a little loop hole, but I don't know if I'll use it… anywho… I hope you enjoyed it, please let me know. Any suggestions for what now, I'm at a standstill… it might take me a while before I come up with new ideas… Anyway, please review.

P.S. oh how hard it is to write baby talk…


	19. Ghosts

**Disclaimer**: I don't own Naruto

**Chapter summary**: A little more angst…

**Thanks for the reviews ;D **

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Itsu wove her hand through the sleeping jonin's hair. He looked so peaceful, resting his head on the hospital bed she laid in.

"You're awake." came a mumble from beneath the mass of silver hair. Kakashi rose from his bent over pose to sit up and look at her better.

"Yeah." Her raspy voice replied; her eyes blood shot, from the tears she refused to shed. She was a kunoichi, and she would NOT cry, even if on the inside she felt like her heart had been ripped straight out of her chest.

"What's wrong?" he asked, seeing the look of pain in her eyes.

"I remember." That was all she need to say for him to know exactly what she was feeling.

He stood from the chair he had been sitting in and moved to sit next to her on the bed, pulling her body into his to try and comfort her. There were no words he could say that could take away the pain that he was all too familiar with. All he could do was hold her as tight as possible and hope that his love would be enough to get her through what he knew would be the greatest pain of all.

"I'm sorry." She tearfully whispered.

Without even thinking, he asked her "What for?"

"It's my fault." She tried desperately to keep her voice as even as possible; attempting to hide the pain from her tone.

"Don't!" Kakashi sternly ordered.

He knew exactly what she was thinking, because he had thought the same thing years ago. He had cursed himself for being away; believing that if only he hadn't gone on that mission, just maybe they wouldn't have died. The sorrow and guilt had nearly driven him mad, and he had tried to end his suffering; but he realized, with time, that it hadn't been his fault, and there had been nothing he could have done. No one could have predicted Itachi's slaughter.

He took her chin into his hand, and pulled her face toward him, "Don't EVER think that." Kakashi said, looking straight into her eyes.

"But…" she began.

"EVER." he repeated, letting go of her chin and pulling her closer into him, gently rocking them back and forth to try and sooth her aching soul.

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"So she knows." Tsunade plainly stated.

"Yeah, she knows." Jiraiya confirmed. "You should have seen her." He looked down, a defeated expression on his face. "As she was telling me what happened. The rage… the pain… the intensity in her voice…" he shuttered to remember, "but her expression; her face… it was completely devoid of emotion." He looked up to face his friend, eye to eye, "It scared me."

If it had been anyone else, Jiraiya never would have admitted that fact, but Tsunade was his oldest friend; they knew each other better than anyone else. Even if they had been apart for long stretches of time, they had a connection that only those who had known each other as long as they had and had lived through the painful experiences they had, could possibly comprehend. He had been there when her brother died and when her beloved died; she had been there when Itsu's mother had died, and Itsu and Obito had been taken from him; and they had both been there for one another when Orochimaru had betrayed the village, breaking his two teammate's hearts.

"It could have been worst old friend." Tsunade replied in a much softer tone. "Be grateful for small favors."

"…" he knew she was right, but he just couldn't get away from the look on Itsu's face as she remembered that dreadful night.

"She's here." Tsunade continued, "as long as that remains true, we can reach her; we can help her."

"And when she sees him again?" There was no need to clarify that he was speaking of Itachi.

It was well known that the Akatsuki had taken down yet another Jinchūriki after they had captured the Kazekage. It was only a matter of time before they made their way back to Konoha for Naruto. And once they discovered that Itsu was still alive, they would surely come back for her as well; that is, if they didn't already know. It wouldn't be long before Itachi showed his face in the village once more.

"We'll have to pray that she can control herself better than Naruto." Tsunade replied, referring to the disastrous power that dwelt within the silver haired kunoichi.

As she remembered devastation that an upset Itsu could create, having been there to help Jiraiya through the girl's terrible twos, Tsunade knew that the calm façade on Itsu's outer self was perhaps the only thing that kept her from wreaking havoc upon the leaf village. If Itachi showed up, however, no one could guarantee that that cool exterior would remain for long. From her own experience, Tsunade knew that however trained one was; however well a kunoichi could hide her true emotions, there still **always **there. Anytime she remembered her younger brother or her beloved, her heart ached with sorrow, and her emotions overtook her. When she'd last seen Orochimaru, she had collapsed an entire castle at the mere mention of the two. Tsunade didn't have the dormant power that Itsu did, nor was her's the pain of a mother at the loss of her child; she could only imagine how Itsu might react at once more seeing the one who murdered her son.

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(Itsu's POV)

Itsu stood outside the enormous house she had once known so well. Despite how harsh the years had been to it, fading the paint, and cracking the walls, it still maintained its simplistic elegance. It had been a rather luxurious wedding gift Jiraiya had given her and Kakashi. Looming larger than any of the neighboring family homes, this house had been witness to many pleasant memories. For that reason, Itsu had sought it out; at that moment, pleasant memories were what she needed most.

"It's beautiful isn't it?" she had expected it to be Kakashi, or even Jiraiya, to be the one she had sensed approaching her as she stood before the crumbling ruins of her past happiness. Instead, she was surprised to see Tsunade standing behind her with a pair of keys in her hands.

"It is." She replied, seeing Tsunade approach the door with the keys.

"They never come here anymore." She was of course referring to two men Itsu had been thinking about moment's earlier. "Too many memories, I suppose." The Godaime shrugged as she opened the door and proceeded to enter; gesturing for Itsu to follow her in.

Unlike the outside that seemed to reflect the years the house stood alone, the inside was in pristine condition.

"I've had Izumo and Kotetsu cleaning this place up and getting it ready for whenever you chose to come back." Tsunade explained, as if reading her mind about the condition of the inside, "It's in the same condition in which you left it."

It was in the same condition Itsu remembered it last being, but at the same time it wasn't. It didn't have the warmth it once held, or the smell of fresh baked treats that she often made with…

Perhaps it had been a mistake to come here. She had been searching for happy memories and thought that their family home would provide this, but every memory of them reminded her of that moment. If she had been alone to wander the grounds of this house she had once called her home, she would have fallen over in tears by now; but she wasn't alone, and she wouldn't.

"You're not alone." The Hokage's voice broke through Itsu's dazed mind.

Could she hear her thoughts? No. That wasn't it. Surely she had meant something else by those words, but Itsu was hardly in the mood to figure out the deeper meaning to what she meant, though she suspected it was meant to comfort her.

"The garden still needs to be fixed, most of the weeds have been pulled out, and the walls need a fresh coat of paint. The roof could probably use a retiling and the screens and shutters need replacing, but for the most part the place hasn't suffered too much damage. I only had the boys clean it up a little." She counted off numerous other repairs and chores, but Itsu only half listened.

Tsunade informed her that after Kakashi had moved out, having been unable to bare living in the huge house all alone, he had never returned, leaving the Jiraiya with the keys. Jiraiya had also been unable to return to the place he'd once considered his second home, and had handed the keys over to Tsunade, who had taken it upon herself to never sell or move anything within the house, believing that one day they may want to come back for some form of closure. When Itsu had reappeared, Tsunade had decided to clean up the place believing that the younger kunoichi would eventually come back to the house in search of her own closure.

"Thank you." Her voice barely above a whisper as she scanned the room they stood in.

Her eyes quickly darted across the room, seeing the freshly polished furniture, and the framed pictures hanging neatly on the walls; images of her once happy little family. Without realizing it, she began walking across the room and heading in the direction of the garden Tsunade had mentioned earlier. It did look unkempt, having some scattered weeds and a dried up lake. Kakashi had dug the lake himself; diverting a small stream from the river to fill it. When Obito was only a year old, he and Itsu had gone out to buy koi fish and lily pads to put in the small lake. It had been one of their favorite places.

She stared at the dried up lake for some time, before she began moving back into the house. As she walked from room to room, reminiscing about the happier days she's spent here, she unknowing walked into the one room she would have preferred never to see again. There were white linen sheets still covering the furniture in this room, and a dusty smell that engulfed her senses, but she was still aware of what room this was. It was _his_ room. The small bed, the rocking chair that Kakashi had made her, the changing table, the toy chest; they were all still there, covered in sheets, mocking her pain, as ghost seemed to do.

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A/N: sorry… I'm kind of stuck as far as ideas, so I pretty much just started writing. Though it doesn't seem like much happened in this chapter, just writing actually helped me come up with some new ideas. This was basically to build up certain things for future chapters and also kind of touch on the past, and how everything ties together… either that or I'm just talking out of my … :P

Anyway, I do have ideas; I'm definitely looking towards bringing Itachi in, in the next few chapters… I'm not entirely sure how I'm going to do that, but I definitely intend to… As for bringing little Obito back (after all I left that window open when Jiraiya mentioned that _his_ body had never been found either)… um… I'm still debating that because I don't know if it would work… I'd have to explain where he's been for the past 6 years… I can't very well say he had amnesia too… but since he disappeared at 2 and he'd be 8, which is still pretty young, he may just not have had a way to get back… still… at two… maybe he would have found his own family and then there's the whole hassle of reuniting with his family… although I could make him an orphan like Naruto was, and finding his family would just be a big happy reunion or something… I don't know, it might be more trouble then its worth… we'll see…

Opinions? Ideas? Suggestions? Please review. **:D**


	20. The Calm Before The Storm

**Disclaimer**: I don't own Naruto

**Thanks for the reviews ;D **

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(Itsu's POV)

The sun was high in the sky, blazing brightly onto the two Uchihas training in the forest. Summer was quickly approaching, and the days had begun to get longer; the sun hotter. They had been training for hours now. Since finding out the truth of what had happened, Itsu had taken to training with Sasuke more and more. It was in part because he hardly spoke, and thus asked no questions, but also because they shared a common enemy and _**that**_ somehow brought her some peace.

"We should rest." She suggested, jumping down from the tree branch she had been positioned on. "You're genjutsu had gotten a lot better." She stated.

"Thanks." He mumbled as he picked up his water bottle and sat himself down on the grassy floor.

"But you can't disregard the illusion while you're also fighting. You have to focus on both." She reminded him.

That had been the major issue for Sasuke. He was talented in genjutsu and taijutsu as well as ninjutsu, but he failed to concentrate on using genjutsu when in combination with one other of the other two forms of fighting. With the help of Itsu, his genjutsu had greatly improved, but he still needed to concentrate on being able to fight and repelling a genjutsu spell, or hold one during the fight, whichever the case may be.

"I'm going to be the one to kill him." Sasuke stated; ending the silence that had overcome them as they sat down to eat the meal they had made to eat hours earlier.

"…" There was nothing for her to reply. She didn't exactly know what she would do if she ever saw Itachi again, so she couldn't very well promise Sasuke she wouldn't stand in his way; just the same, she knew that living your life for revenge only served to consume you, body and soul.

"I know what he did. But **I** will be the one to avenge our clan." He calmly repeated before standing up and walking off. But he didn't know; not really. He was too young to remember…

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"I hear she's been training with Sasuke a lot." Jiraiya groaned, knowing fully well why.

"Yeah, she seems intent on avoiding whatever she's feeling by replacing physical pain for emotional." Kakashi responded, taking a sweet dumpling from the plate in front of him.

Jiraiya had just returned from another scouting expedition to gather information about the Akatsuki. After meeting with the Hokage, he had decided to also inform Kakashi of what he had discovered, since he figured Kakashi was probably as interested in the information as he was.

"What did you find out?" Kakashi asked, watching as the toad sage swirled the sake in his cup as if he were contemplating something.

"They know about Itsu." Jiraiya replied after a short pause.

Finding out if they had discovered the existence of a second Jinchūriki in the leaf village had been Jiraiya's primary reason for searching the Akatsuki this time. He knew, from previous information, that the organization always had people watching Konoha, though only the actual Akatsuki members collected the Jinchūriki; the foot soldiers served only to gather information and occasionally to be possessed by their leader's jutsu and sacrificed for his cause.

"Are they planning anything?" Kakashi asked worriedly.

"I couldn't find anything concrete," Jiraiya shook his head, "but I did see a lot of movement. I don't know if that means they'll be coming in on a full scale attack, or do as they usually do, and bring in two teams instead of one to bring back both Naruto and Itsu. But I don't doubt that they'll try for both at the same time."

"This won't be good." Kakashi shook his head in disbelief.

"No it won't." Jiraiya took another drink of his sake.

"Naruto, alone is impulsive and easily angered." Kakashi stated.

"That's true." Jiraiya agreed, "The Kyuubi is very strong, no doubt stronger than Houkou, but Houkou has unstable elements that we know can cause catastrophic destruction…" he paused, "and with Itsu repressing her emotions…"

"It could get ugly." Kakashi finished for him.

The Kyuubi, being the strongest of the tailed demon's, had wreaked havoc upon Konoha many years ago, killing villagers and destroying large parts of the village. But the Kyuubi's limitless power was perhaps less destructive than the Houkou's unstable power. Because the Houkou, unlike the other tailed beasts, carried within it, more than one type of elemental chakra, the five-tails had a capacity for devastation that none of the other beast held. For the most part, Itsu had been a calm child growing up, but when she entered into her terrible twos, the instability of the elemental chakra within her had resulted in many natural disasters during her temper tantrums. Though she had learned to restrain herself and her emotions, the instability still resided within her, and could potentially be very dangerous if she ever allowed herself to lose control.

"Should we tell them?" Kakashi asked.

"Tsunade is going to take care of that." Jiraiya replied.

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Naruto and Itsu waited patiently outside of the Hokage's office; at least as patiently as Naruto was capable of.

"I wonder what granny Tsunade wants us for." Naruto wondered out loud as he paced back and forth in front of the Hokage's office.

"…" Itsu didn't reply. She sat on the bench in front of the Hokage's office with her eyes closed, attempting to meditate and ignore the boy who kept running back and forth in front of her. It was obvious to her why the two had been called to the Godaime's office, since the only thing these two had in common was that they were both Jinchūriki. They also had Jiraiya and Kakashi in common, but it was unlikely that this meeting had anything to do with them.

"Maybe she's got a mission for us!" Naruto exclaimed loudly, "What do you think Itsu-chan?" he asked the silver haired kunoichi.

"I don't do missions, Naruto." She reminded the boy.

Though she had remembered everything, the Hokage had decided that it was best to keep Itsu from missions until her mental stability could be assessed; of course she told Itsu that it was merely precautionary, and she would soon be taking missions. Still, Itsu didn't quite think this was the reason for the meeting, especially since she highly doubted that the Godaime would pair her up with Naruto for a mission.

"You can go in now." Shizune motioned for them to follow her into the office.

Inside, Tsunade was sitting behind a mountain of files.

"Good, good; you're here." Tsunade cleared some files from her desk so she could better see the two ninjas.

"Why'd you send for us?" Naruto impatiently asked, as he jumped up and down excitedly, hoping it was some dangerous mission he'd been chosen for.

"Naruto." Tsunade growled. "Stand still." She ordered.

"Fine." Naruto groaned, as he slumped down to take a seat on the Hokage's floor.

"Now, Itsu." Tsunade turned to the younger kunoichi.

"Yes?" Itsu acknowledged.

"What I'm about to tell the two of you, Naruto is already aware of." Tsunade began, "I'm sure you've probably heard of the Akatsuki by now, am I right?" she looked at Itsu to try and read her expression.

"I'm aware that Itachi is a member of that organization." Itsu coldly replied. She had heard rumors about Itachi's involvement with the Akatsuki, but she wasn't yet fully aware of what their purpose was.

"That's true." Tsunade asserted, "We have unconfirmed information that Itachi's attack on the Uchiha's was in an attempt to steal you away without raising any suspicions about the organization."

"But why?" Itsu asked, unsure of where this was going.

"To steal the bijuu." Naruto stood up from where he had been moping on the floor.

"What?" Itsu turned to face him, then back toward the hokage, and then back again towards Naruto. She didn't understand what they meant.

"That's right." Tsunade nodded, "The Akatsuki's goal seems to be to collect all the tailed demons by unsealing them from their Jinchūriki hosts." Tsunade explained, "What they plan to do with them, we can only image."

"So you're telling me, the murder of my mother's clan…" Itsu began.

"NO!" Tsunade stopped her.

She understood what Itsu was thinking, and she didn't want her to go down that path; especially because the hokage already knew that the silver haired kunoichi already felt responsible for the death of her son, she didn't want Itsu to also feel guilt over the death of her clan.

"Why are you telling us this, granny Tsunade?" Naruto asked curiously.

"Well, Naruto," Tsunade sighed exasperatedly, "We have reason to believe that the Akatsuki knows about Itsu's return. And since we already know they have targeted you in the past, we can only suspect that they'll be moving towards Konoha to try and take _**both**_ of you."

"When?" Itsu asked. She wasn't interested in the Akatsuki, or in their plans to steal the bijuu's from the tailed-demon hosts, but if this were all true, then it meant Itachi would be coming back to Konoha.

"Soon." was Tsunade's short reply.

"Good." Naruto clenched his fist as he tried to hold back his rage.

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Outside the gates of Konoha, a low chirping could be heard. It was a signal between the dark figures hidden in the trees. They were quickly approaching the outskirts of village, surrounding the outer walls…

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**A/N:** I know this chapter's kind of short, but I didn't want to start the battle stuff yet… at the same time I wanted to actually post something because I don't know how long it's going to be before I finish the battle stuff. I think I only have a few chapters left in this story, mostly because I actually have to start on my reading assignments for the first week of school… and then school… so… if anyone has any suggestions or something they want to see in story before it ends, let me know now, because I won't be having much time to write after school starts…


	21. Itachi

**Disclaimer**: I don't own Naruto

**Chapter summary**: The Akatsuki attacks.

**Thanks for the reviews ;D **

I apologize if my Akatsuki are OOC… I'm not that familiar with them… or maybe I just don't care about them all that much… also, I want to warn you now, my fight scenes may not be all that actiony… so try not to be too disappointed.

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Outside the gates of Konoha, a low chirping sound could be heard. It was a signal between the dark figures hidden in the trees. They were quickly approaching the outskirts of the village, surrounding the outer walls.

There were dozens of them, scattered throughout the forest surround the village, quickly approaching their target.

"Itachi." The scaly faced partner of the former Konoha shinobi called from a few trees over.

"What is it Kisame?" Itachi asked.

"Why did we bring so many extra men to help capture just two Jinchūriki?" He asked.

"Unlike the other tailed beasts, these two Jinchūriki actually have people who defend them." Itachi impassively explained.

"That is true, usually Jinchūriki are lonely people who loathe humanity, and whose villages do not care about in the least. We normally have few difficulties when attempting to take a Jinchūriki, but this has not been the case with the nine-tails." Kisame calmly observed.

"And it will be the same with the five-tails." Itachi coldly stated.

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At the main gates of Konoha, the evening shift was being made to replace the two sentries that had been watching over the only open entrance into the village. The sun was nearly set, and the lights throughout the village began to slowly flicker on. Elsewhere in the village, sentry duties were also being changed in intervals of even fifteen minutes, so as not to leave any openings for enemy attacks.

There was a chill in the air, which seemed rather unusual for this time in late spring, early summer. The nearly full moon had yet to rise within the deep blue sky, but a few stars were already beginning to twinkle on the dark canvas.

"Looks like it's going to be a calm night." Kotetsu signed, looking up at the cloudless sky.

"Looks that way." Izumo agreed as he took a seat on the small wooden bench located inside the guard's station.

"Hey Kotetsu, hey Izumo." Naruto, with Sasuke in tow, walked up to the guard's station.

"Oh, Naruto, it's been a while." Izumo greeted.

"Boys." Kotetsu nodded his head in acknowledgement, "Finished training for the day?" he asked.

"Hai!" Naruto replied. "We're on our way to eat ramen." He excitedly informed them.

A rustling in the trees just outside of Konoha caught Sasuke's attention. He turned to look, but saw nothing unusual.

"What?" Naruto asked, sensing Sasuke's sudden alertness.

"I thought I saw something." Sasuke replied dryly.

"What'd you see?" Naruto asked. Izumo and Kotetsu also turned to look out into the darkening forest outside Konoha's walls.

"Yo!" a sudden puff of smoke appeared before the four shinobi, temporarily distracting them from the shadows outside the main gates.

"Hey Kaka-sensei." Naruto greeted the older man. The three other shinobi also exchanged greetings.

"Sasuke." Kakashi asked, "Have you seen…" he abruptly stopped speaking and looked out into the forest.

"Did you see something too?" Kotetsu asked upon noticing Kakashi remove his forehead protector from his left eye.

"We're surrounded." Kakashi plainly stated.

"WE ARE?!?" Naruto yelled out.

"Quiet Naruto." Kakashi warned, still staring out into the forest with his sharingan eye.

"It's him." Sasuke fought the urge to run out in unyielding rage like he did the last time that Itachi came to the village. But a lot had changed since then, he was not the same simple minded child he had once been. He knew that to win a fight, one had to have more than skill and passion; one had to have a plan.

"WHAT!?" Naruto however, had yet to stop being the loudmouth kid who was always the first to charge.

"Naruto." Kakashi warned again, this time placing a hand on the boy's shoulder to keep him from doing something foolish; after all, Kakashi knew the boy well.

"What should we do?" Izumo asked, waiting for the jonin's signal.

"Close the gates." Kakashi ordered. "Quickly."

The five of them moved swiftly to close the main gates.

"Sasuke, inform the hokage. It won't take long for the attack to occur now that they know we're on to them." Kakashi stated, "Naruto, use your shadow clones and immediately start gathering all the remaining shinobi and kunoichi in the village and tell them the Akatsuki are at our door. Izumo, Kotetsu," He turn to the two sentries, "begin the evacuation of all civilians into the tunnels."

"Hai." The four shinobi agreed and immediately took off in the direction they were ordered to.

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The enemy knew they had been spotted and thus had lost the element of surprise. However, the gates would only prove to be a minor set back, Konoha did not know how many were out side it's walls, and that was still an element in their favor.

"We must move quickly now." Itachi stated.

"Just because they know we're here doesn't mean they can fight us all off." Kisame replied, "I have information that only a handful of shinobi are left in the village, and most of them are chunin level or below; very few jonin or ANBU remain at this moment."

"I am aware of this." Itachi dryly replied, "However, we didn't expect for Kakashi to have returned from his mission early, and though his sharingan may not be able to see how many our numbers are, there are other clans who have this ability, we must not give them time to prepare."

"Hai." Kisame knew it was best to trust his partner on these matters. He turned to an Akatsuki agent, "Inform the rest. We attack on Itachi-san's command." The agent immediate leapt into the air to fulfill his order.

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The chill in the air that had early seemed to promise a cool, cloudless night, now eerily grazed the spins of the few shinobi and kunoichi left in the village. The evacuation had been swiftly executed, removing all civilians from harms ways.

The handful of Konoha ninja waited anxiously for the enemy's first move. Kakashi had wisely thought to find the Hyugas' to determine just how many shinobi stood outside the village walls. It was estimated that at least fifty Akatsuki agents currently accompanied Itachi and Kisame. Neji had been the one to recognize their chakra, and informed Kakashi that they appeared to be the only Akatsuki members among the enemy-nin. However, that still left Konoha slightly outnumbered, with little under three dozen ninja ranked higher above genin.

Tsunade had ordered all genin to be in charge of guarding the safety of the villagers, thereby leaving the remaining higher ranked chunin and jonin to help defend the village. Among those present were: Kakashi, Sasuke, Shikamaru, Ino, Choji, Neji, Tenten, Lee, Gai, Anko, Izumo, Kotetsu, Tsunade, and of course Naruto and Itsu, whom the Akatsuki were targeting.

"There are too many shinobi out on missions, how are we supposed to fight against so many?" some random Chunin, who had just been relieved of sentry duty moments earlier, argued.

"There are more of them then there are of us, but that doesn't mean they have the upper hand." Kakashi calmly replied, "This is our home, and we know it better than any of those out there."

"That's right!" Tsunade agreed, "Use this to your advantage!"

"Do we know anything about the enemy?" another random chunin asked.

"All we know is that the two leading this group are Akatsuki members. Which means the rest are probably agents, either under a hypnosis jutsu or faithful followers." Kakashi informed the group. "Just worry about the agents, for now. Be on guard though, Akatsuki recruits only the finest shinobi, sometimes even beginning their training from a very early age."

Suddenly a loud explosion at the main gates, followed shortly after by a second and third in different parts of the village walls, ran through the village, abruptly putting an end to the impromptu mission briefing. The Leaf ninja immediately separated into groups designated earlier by the Hokage and took off in the different directions of each explosion.

An all out war soon ensued, the Akatsuki agents serving to distract Konoha's ninja, leaving Itachi and Kisame to go after their prey relatively undisturbed.

Neji had indicated that the duo would be entering from the main gate, but it appeared that the two Akatsuki members had decided to split up and move in from some different directions; as a result it was unclear as to where each currently was.

Fearing that Naruto's impulsive nature would once again blind him from potential danger, Kakashi decided to stay with him, but when he turned to look for said boy, Naruto had already disappeared. Sasuke had also run off, no doubt to find Itachi; but what frightened Kakashi the most was the Itsu had also disappeared.

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"BASTARD!" a giant fireball flew through the air directed at Itachi, who easily dodged it. (A/N: stupid Sasuke, why do they shout _before_ they attack?)

Sasuke had managed to track down Itachi near one of the old training grounds. It was similar to team seven's training grounds, cleared of all trees and buildings, and close enough to the river that ran through the forest of Konoha.

"Itachi." Sasuke spat the name out as if it were venom on his lips.

"Foolish little brother." Itachi's emotionless black eyes stared impassively at Sasuke's fury driven body. "You could never hope to defeat me."

"I WILL kill you!" Sasuke fumed, preparing for another attack. "I've gotten much stronger since we last saw each other." He stated, as he quickly prepared to strike Itachi with a new move he had learned during his time under Orochimaru's tutelage, all the while remembering to protect himself from Itachi's genjutsu.

Sasuke attacked with all his might, and for once it seemed that he might actually be a match for Itachi, who only barely managed to dodge all of his attacks. But for as much training, and as much talent as Sasuke had, Itachi's cool demeanor gave him an edge over Sasuke's impulsive rage. Before Sasuke saw it coming, Itachi had pinned him with his left hand, to a nearby tree.

"What a wasted life." Itachi dryly stated, looking into Sasuke's raging face. "You're a disappointment, brother. Not worth killing." Sasuke cringed at the familiar words his brother had spat out at him so many years earlier. "Perhaps I should put you out of your misery." Itachi coldly looked down upon his brother before lifting his right arm from under his black cloak to stab the younger boy with a hidden dagger.

A sudden flash of light blinded both Uchiha's. Before either knew what had happened, Sasuke was no longer within Itachi's grasp. Instead he lay sprawled on the floor across from the line of trees where Itachi had been holding him.

As Sasuke turned to find out what had happened, he saw Itsu standing over what appeared to be an unconscious Itachi.

"NO!" Sasuke yelled out, "He's mine!"

"I'm sorry." Itsu whispered, before plunging a kodachi in the body before her, before realizing Itachi had replaced himself with a log. She immediate jumped back and scanned the area to see where the man in question had disappeared to. (A/N: kodachi is a short sword).

"ITSU!" Sasuke yelled out, running towards her. Unfortunately for Sasuke, he was no longer a part of the fight, as he realized all too late that a barrier had been erected, which sent him flying back to the floor.

"I see." Itachi came out from behind the tree he had hidden himself after using the replacement jutsu. "So that's what you were doing while Sasuke and I were fighting."

"So you noticed." Itsu impassively turned to face the Akatsuki member.

"It's been a long time… Cousin." Itachi glared at the silver haired kunoichi. "I see rumors of your demise were sorely exaggerated."

"Of course," Itsu coldly replied. "I wouldn't be killed by a pathetic little psychopath who hides in shadows and attacks from behind." She spat out, as she prepared her stance.

She stood expressionless before the two brothers. The icy breeze gently blew through the few loose strands of her hair, which was tied up in a long braid that reached the small of her back. She moved to adjust the twin kodachi positioned on either side of her slim waist. Her light blue mid-thigh kimono clung close to her skin, allowed for free movement; something which her double kodachi taijutsu fighting style required.

"ITSU!" Sasuke yelled from the other side of the barrier, visibly upset with the fact that she had stolen his opportunity to take his revenge.

"I apologize Sasuke." Itsu addressed the younger boy, while never taking her eyes off of Itachi.

"Shall we begin?" Itachi didn't wait for the answer; he lunged towards the kunoichi and began his attack.

The fight that resulted seemed an even match, each attacking and dodging the other with great effort. Being genjutsu users, the both of them, it seemed unlikely that they'd be able to win with mere illusions. Unable to determine whether he could beat her using his genjutsu abilities, Itachi decided to try for ninjutsu instead; not wanting to risk overusing his eyes, which had begun to slowly deteriorate with each use of his sharingan.

"Don't worry, this will be quick." Itsu venomously replied, though still maintaining her composure, "But I promise, it _**will**_ be painful."

She pulled out her two kodachi and prepared for her next attack. She began by using a flash step, circling Itachi in an effort to confuse and disorient with fluid motions and continuous changes in her speed, then rapidly spinning around three times, while holding the kodachi backhanded, and slashing him thrice in an instant. He was able to dodge the last two strikes, but the first one caught him by surprised, and managed to strike him in the left arm.

From outside the barrier, Sasuke seethed in anger towards both Itachi and Itsu, though each for different reasons. The fighting sounds emanating from the rest of the village seemed to have died down; whatever the outcome, it seemed that one side was already winning.

"You seemed more focused then the last time we fought." Itachi made reference to that horrible night in Itsu's memory.

The images that his words conjured up caused Itsu's icy façade to momentarily drop, resulting in an opening, which Itachi took full advantage of. He flung himself towards her, using the dagger he had tried to kill Sasuke with earlier. He managed to stab her in the abdomen, resulting in a severe wound.

The momentary emotion that blinded Itsu soon became replaced with a rage burning up inside her, waking the dormant power that lay within. The spirit of Houkou began stirring as her anger rose on seeing the smirk upon his face.

"YOU WILL DIE!" she shouted, as she dropped both kodachi on the ground.

The instable chakra of the five tailed demon rose within in; a powerful silver glow surrounded her body, whirling in inconsistent circular motions around her. Her eyes, neither sharingan, nor their typical unusual violet hue, burned in a fiery crimson.

"HEAVENLY FURY!" she called out her lightening jutsu. She raised her arms and summoned a blue lightning bolt, which crashed down upon Itachi. He managed to clumsily dodge the bolt, barely singeing his Akatsuki cloak.

Itachi countered with one of his fire-style jutsu, at which point Itsu took the opportunity to disappear into the fire, a jutsu she had created using her bijuu's fire elemental abilities. Before he knew what was coming, Itsu stepped out from behind Itachi, and grabbed hold of him with a water whip she had quickly created, using the water from the river behind them.

"I have you." She whispered from behind him.

By this point, the fighting throughout the village had died down, and the loud commotion Itsu and Itachi's battle had created, caused most of the shinobi to make their way towards the source of all that noise. Outside the barrier, watching the battle with Sasuke, Kakashi had managed to find his way toward the scene, along with Naruto, Team Gai, Tsunade and Shikamaru.

"Itsu." Sasuke growled outside the barrier. _**He**_ was supposed to be the one to kill Itachi. She was robbing him of his right to avenge his clan.

"Sasuke." Kakashi quietly spoke; there was a hint of warning in his tone. "You don't know…" he allowed those three words to cling in the air. Sasuke didn't know. He didn't know that Itsu had as much right, if not more so, then him, to exact her revenge on Itachi.

As she prepared to take the final blow, ready to avenge her son's death, she stared out into the crowd outside the barrier. There was no expression on her face. It was cold and emotionless; the face of a true shinobi, void of all expression. But in her eyes, if one were to look closely, they would see a hint of pain. Killing Itachi, though exactly what she desired, would not quench the thirst for vengeance she harbored in her soul, and she knew this act alone, could very well lead down a very dark path she would be unable to turn back from.

"I wouldn't, if I were you." A loud voice came from the other side of the barrier, away from where the others were gathered to watch the battle.

Everyone turned to face the shark faced man who had spoken.

"And why exactly not?" Itsu snarled, bearing her fangs at the second Akatsuki member.

"Well we wouldn't want anything to happen to little Obi-chan now would we?" a sinister smirk spread across his blue face. Next, he pushed a boy, no more than eight years of age, in front of him.

"What?" she gasped…

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**A/N:** dun dun dun… I'm so cruel… but well… it's late… and I'm tired of writing… this took FOREVER… I tried my best with the fight scenes… but well... I'm not a fighter, I'm a lover :P… and I'm much better at fluff… so… eh… whatever… At least I can say something actually HAPPENED in this chapter… and I'm guessing it's probably my longest one yet… yay me… :D…

Thanks for the support… I'm glad people are still reading and liking it. :D


	22. Answers

**Disclaimer**: I don't own Naruto

**Chapter summary**: The fight continues.

**Thanks for the reviews ;D **

I apologize if my Akatsuki are OOC… I'm not that familiar with them… or maybe I just don't care about them all that much…

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"I wouldn't, if I were you." A chilling voice came from outside the barrier.

Everyone turned to face the shark faced man who had spoken.

"And why exactly not?" Itsu snarled, bearing her fangs at Kisame.

"Well we wouldn't want anything to happen to little Obi-chan now would we?" a sinister smirk spread across his blue face.

He pushed a small boy, no more than eight years of age, in front of him. The boy had silver hair, much her own, and large dark blue eyes that seemed to shine with the same metallic shimmer that Itsu's own violet eyes shone with. He was dressed in all black, similar to what the other Akatsuki agents were all wearing.

"What?" she gasped.

She looked at the scene in disbelief. This had to be an illusion. She was sure she'd been trapped in some form of genjutsu, and just hadn't realized it. But she was a master of genjutsu, it wasn't possible. _Then how?_ She asked herself.

"What kind of trickery is this?" she hissed at Itachi, whom she was now holding in her grasp; a kunai at his throat.

"This is no trick." Itachi plainly replied; no trace of fear in his voice, over his current position.

"YOU LIE!" she emotionally shouted, unable to contain herself much longer. "Obito died. I SAW IT!" her resolve to remain unmoved and emotionless slowly breaking.

"Not at all." Kisame interrupted her break down from outside the barrier, "You should thank Itachi-san. If he hadn't thought to save the boy, he _**would**_ be dead."

"You saved him?" the disbelief in her voice was evident.

"Of course, I'm not that heartless." Itachi coldly replied.

Outside the barrier, Kakashi watch the scene unfold, unsure as to whether or not this all was actually true. He knew it was not a genjutsu, and the boy did look eerily identical to himself, but did that mean he was really little Obito? He found it hard to believe that after all these years this could have happened. It was miraculous enough that Itsu had come back from the grave those many months ago, but now Obito too? Kakashi feared that perhaps he were losing his sanity, at least what little there was left of it, and maybe all this was just some made up reality that his mind had conjured up for him.

"You." Itsu's emotions were threatening to overpower her; she didn't know what to believe anymore. One thing she was certain of, however, was the Itachi HAD to die.

"No, no, no." Kisame warned, pointing a dagger similar to the one Itachi had been fighting with at the next of the young boy. "Let Itachi-san go." He ordered.

"How do we know you're telling the truth?" Kakashi asked from the other side of the barrier.

"Don't you recognize your own son?" Itachi answered.

"This could be a trick." Tsunade offered from beside Kakashi.

"That's right. WE HAVE NO REASON TO TRUST WHAT YOU SAY IS TRUE!" Gai angrily shouted.

Everyone had been quietly observing the whole scene for some time now, wondering the same thing. Was this the child that Kakashi and Itsu had lost all those years ago? The younger ninja, who had been unaware of the young boy's existence, let alone his untimely demise, were watching as the story unfolded before them, but even they knew that the Akatsuki were no to be trusted.

"The Akatsuki trains only the best," Kisame began, "We couldn't possibly allow an opportunity like the son of a Jinchūriki to pass us by. There's never before been a single case of a Bijuu host even producing an offspring, we had to know if it would inherit some of the demon's spirit."

"So it's true." Itsu whispered still unsure of whether she really believed them or not. "You're incapable of compassion, but curiosity is something you have never lacked." She fixed her eyes on the kunai in her hand.

"Hn. Curiosity?" Itachi smirked, "I couldn't care less about you or your worthless spawn. I merely took him because I couldn't bring you in." he informed her.

She took her time to process everything the two Akatsuki members had informed her of. Deciding that it was in fact her son the blue beast held in his arms, she did the only thing a mother could do in a situation like that; she lowered her weapon.

Itachi didn't waste a moment, and immediately crossed the short distance within the barrier to where Kisame stood with the youngest Hatake. Just as he was about to instruct Kisame to kill the boy, in hopes that Itsu would release the barrier to help her son, Kakashi appeared from behind the scaly faced shinobi and reached for the child. Because he had replaced himself with a shadow clone, unnoticed by any of those present, the two cloaked men hadn't seen him coming, and he was able to snatch the young boy away from them.

"I have him." There was no reason for him to shout; Itsu had seen it coming before the others.

As Itachi turned to see what would result from the copy-nin's actions, he barely managed to dodge a giant fireball directed at him. While he moved to get away from the fireball, Itsu ran towards her discarded kodachi, laying a few feet from where she stood.

Noticing her move to snatch the twin kodachi, Itachi prepared to send a bolt of flame in her direction. Using one of his own fire jutsu's, by condensing the flame into a denser jet, he sent a bolt of fire from his fingers towards the two weapons, making them too hot for her to pick up.

"Play time is over, I see." Itsu stared up at the man, from where she was crouching next to her scalding weapons.

"We end this now." his icy demeanor giving way to frustration.

It never took him this long to defeat an opponent; then again, he'd never tired to defeat anyone as strong as Itsu without the use of his sharingan. But he knew it would be useless to try, since she had long since mastered the ability herself, and it would only serve to harm his already deteriorating eyes. If he had to use it, it would be as a last resort.

Outside the barrier, Kakashi had used a genjutsu to knock the already semiconscious Obito out, and handed him over to Tsunade. The boy was clearly not within his full senses when Kisame brought him out. It seemed that perhaps he had been sedated or hypnotized.

Meanwhile, after he had handed Obito over to Tsunade to be taken care of, Kakashi, with the help of Gai, moved to immobilize Kisame and the few Akatsuki agents who had also made their way over to the commotion of Itachi and Itsu's battle. The rest of the Konoha ninja also helped them out, fighting the other agents and continuing the battle to protect the village. Only Sasuke remained unmoved; he eyes trained on the battle within the barrier. He was still fuming at Itsu's betrayal, but at least now he understood better.

Jabs, punches, spinning kicks, fire balls, lightning bolts and mini tornado's began tearing up the clearing within the barrier, as Itachi and Itsu's battle continued. Both their bodies were within the limits of their strength, both suffering from severe wounds and depleted chakra. Even Itsu, whose chakra was greater than Itachi's, due to the demon spirit she carried within, seemed to be waning. The amount of chakra her jutsu's required, no mere ninja could withstand the drain of, but even then, she had always been able to stand longer stretches to her reserves. Though the five-tail's chakra was not nearly as limitless as that of the nine-tails, she still held more chakra in her than any normal shinobi. Why then was she beginning to feel depleted?

"You're looking tired, cousin." Itachi breathed heavily as he spoke.

"No more than you." She replied, panting profusely.

"Yes, but you should be able to with stand longer then even a genius like myself." Itachi mocked.

"Hn." She grunted in reply.

"Would you like to know why?" Itachi swung his dagger at her as he asked.

"…" she dodged the dagger, cart-wheeling backwards to get away from him.

"Wouldn't you like to know what we've learned about your son?" he smirked at the flinch she tried unsuccessfully to suppress.

Even though her mind knew that Obito was alive, and that she should be grateful for this, her heart had yet to process the information and thus still harbored great hatred toward the man before her.

"Nothing you say will keep me from destroying you." Itsu proceeded to form hand seals for her next jutsu.

After performing her hand seals, she slammed her open fist down on the dirt floor, and spun her hand in a clockwise motion twice, followed by on counter clockwise turn. Itachi watched in wonder, waiting for whatever jutsu this might be. No sooner had she finished shooting her chakra into the ground, had the earth below the barrier began to tremble. Outside the barrier everything appeared the same, since her barrier extended further down into the earth's crust than any shinobi could ever tunnel into.

"What have you done?" Itachi wondered, as the ground below him began to grow hot.

He noticed Itsu forming new hand seals, and then blowing out ice on the ground below her feet. The ground below him continued to increase in temperature, as the soil turned red, and a river of lava seemed to be bubbling to the surface from where Itsu had shot chakra into the ground.

The time for last resorts had arrived, and Itachi had been clever enough to activate his sharingan when he noticed Itsu performing her first hand seals. He immediately mimicked the second set of hand seals and froze the entire floor below the barrier, just before the lava was within inches of reaching him.

"I won't be defeated that easily." Itachi scolded, "but I must say, that was quiet an impressive jutsu. Though it must have drained you greatly." He stated, as he motioned towards the flickering barrier, that appeared ready to collapse.

No sooner had he made the comment, did barrier come down. Ready to take this opportunity to escape, having realized that today would not be the day to bring back the two Jinchūriki, when Sasuke came out at him, chidori fully activated, and ready to exact his revenge.

Just as Sasuke was about to finish Itachi off, Itsu's chakra finally gave out, and she fainted into the blackness that surrounded her…

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**A/N:** I know… major cop out… if you read my Soraoi story; you know that I did the same thing during that "battle" scene too… Honestly this "fight scene" went on only because I couldn't figure out how to end it… so I resorted to an easy out and had the main character faint and have it fade to black… lol… A little reminiscent of the first chapter, nah? Anywho… the next chapter is likely to be the last one… so… I guess I'll work on it today and then maybe tomorrow so I can start on my assignments for school… wow… It looks like I'm actually keeping to the schedule I set out for myself… good for me. :D

Hope you liked the chapter… let me know if I left it unclear as to why Obito is back… I'm pretty sure I cleared that up for the most part… but it's entirely possible that it makes sense in my head and no where else… so just let me know what you think… thanks to everyone whose been reviewing and sending me PM's through the site. ;)

'sigh' I finished this earlier today, and I wanted to post is as soon as possible, because I hate leaving you all on a cliffy… but for some reason the site wouldn't allow me to upload the document… just one of the many glitches had to offer… but I still love the set up.. anyway… seeing as how my ride to this festival I'm going to is (as always) late… I'm hoping I can post this chapter now…


	23. The Aftermath

**Disclaimer**: I don't own Naruto

**Chapter summary**: The aftermath.

**Thanks for the reviews ;D **

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(Itsu's POV)

The blindingly white walls and ceiling in Konoha hospital were beginning to be very familiar to one silver haired kunoichi. She didn't need to look around to know that the room she was in was the same as the one she'd first woken up in those many months ago when she had had no idea who she was. She also didn't need to look around to know that the room was filled with all the people who had been there for her this whole time during her process of regaining her memory and reintegrating herself into a world that had long since believed she had faded away.

As she lay there contemplating everything that had occurred to her in the last several months, she could feel the ache in her body heatedly pulsing to the beat of her heart.

"OBITO!" she shot up to a sitting position, remembering why she had ended up in the hospital once more.

The sudden movement sent a jolt of pain coursing through her body, nearly opening the stitches to the large wound on her abdomen that Itachi had made with his dagger. She winced in pain, and fell back down onto the hospital bed; her breathing labored from the sensation.

"He's fine." Kakashi's voice called out from the chair beside her bed.

Just as before, he had sat there patiently waiting for her to regain consciousness. Behind him, Gai and Genma looked down worriedly at their former teammate and friend. They had been taking turns keeping Kakashi company, and informing him of the progress ANBU had managed to make with the couple's young son.

"Where?" Itsu managed to chock out. Her throat felt dry and coarse, almost as if she hadn't used it in days.

"He's with ANBU." Genma volunteered.

"They believe that the Akatsuki used a mind control jutsu to control the boy." Jiraiya said from his corner of the room.

Itsu stared at the man. He had been following the Akatsuki for so many years, why was it that he had not known of their kidnapping his grandson? Nothing seemed to be making any sense to her.

"They took him at such a young age, he probably doesn't remember much about the village, or his family." Jiraiya solemnly said, "But at least we have him back."

So that meant that he wouldn't remember her. Would he still be the cheerful boy they had once known? Or an empty shell of his former self? If he had been under the jutsu for all those years, what kind of effect would that have had on his mind? On his soul? Itsu dreaded to think what the answers to these, and so many other unasked questions, were.

"DO NOT WORRY ITSU-CHAN, I AM SURE YOUNG OBITO-CHAN WILL RECOVER; JUST AS YOU HAVE." Gai enthusiastically exclaimed, much to the annoyance of Genma and Kakashi whose ears he had just shouted into.

"Thanks Gai." Itsu smiled sweetly at her old friend.

It had been weeks since she'd last smiled; ever since she remembered what had happened that horrible night of the Uchiha massacre. Now that she knew the truth, it made the faded memory more tolerable, and allowed her to regain her former cheerfulness. This gave the other's, who had always known her as a smiling girl, hope that she would soon recover, not only from her physical wounds, but her emotional ones as well.

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"So now that you finally got your revenge, how do you feel Sasuke?" Naruto asked his gloomy friend.

Naruto and Sakura had invited Sasuke to join them for lunch at Naruto's favorite place; Ichiraku.

"Surprisingly, better than I thought I would." Sasuke calmly replied from between Naruto and Sakura.

"It's a good thing you listened to Kaka-sensei." Sakura cheerfully smiled.

At the last moment, Itachi had activated his sharingan to its Mangekyo form. Sasuke and he had fought, with Sasuke as the clear victor. Exhausted from his battle with Itsu, Itachi had been unable to put up much of a fight. As Sasuke was getting ready to deliver the final blow, Kakashi had stepped in to stop him.

----------**FLASHBACK**----------

"What's the meaning of this?" Sasuke looked up angrily at Kakashi, who had caught his chidori armed hand.

"Sasuke!" Kakashi sternly looked down at the boy, "Forget about revenge."

"Not this again." Sasuke rolled his eyes.

"I told you before," Kakashi began, "Even if you do succeed in killing Itachi, the only thing that will remain is emptiness." He repeated the words he had lectured Sasuke with years earlier. (A/N: episode 108)

"Shut up, what do you know anyway?" Sasuke shouted.

"I know you don't really want this." Kakashi's tone softened.

He could see the scared little boy that Sasuke still held within, and knew the killing Itachi wasn't his true desire. After the Uchiha massacre, Kakashi had felt anger towards Itachi, but it wasn't his death he wanted; what he wanted most in the world, was that one day. That one day, to make everything good again; to erase that dark moment altogether.

"Killing him won't bring them back." Kakashi released Sasuke's hand.

The fury in Sasuke's eyes had died down, but inside an inner war still raged. He didn't know what to do. Would killing Itachi really make him feel better? Or would it leave him feeling empty? With Itachi gone, his purpose for being would also disappear.

----------**End of FLASHBACK**----------

"It's like Kaka-sensei said, 'an eye for an eye, leaves the whole world blind.'" Sakura quoted.

"Hey, is that why Itachi went blind?" a confused Naruto asked.

"NARUTO!" Sakura shouted, "We weren't talking about that, Naruto!"

"It means violence only leads to more violence; revenge solves nothing." Sasuke explained.

"So is that why you let Itachi live?" Naruto asked.

"That, and I realized, if I let him live, he'd pay for his crimes every day of his life… in darkness." A satisfied smile spread across the Uchiha's face.

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A/N: If you didn't get it… Itachi went blind… why? Because of the Mangekyo Sharingan. Sasuke let Itachi live, and Obito was being controlled, so he's actually a good boy…

Okay… so this isn't the last chapter… in fact… there's three more chapters left… BUT… they're not really chapters… they're endings… three endings to be exact… and I will be posting all three at the same time…

Just so you know… the three endings will be separated into different chapters, and they'll be kind of short… since it's just the last "happily ever after" and what not…

The NEXT chapter is the official end… the one I chose as the end… and the other's are alternate endings… just think of it as the alternate endings in the special features of a DVD… **:P**


	24. Happily Ever After

**Disclaimer**: I don't own Naruto

**Chapter summary**: And they lived Happily Ever After.

**Thanks for the reviews ;D **

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Four months had passed since the Akatsuki had attacked the village, and Hatake Obito had returned to the hidden leaf. Much had changed during that short time. With the help of ANBU specialist who worked with mind control jutsu's, Obito was able to reintegrate himself into the village. He had managed to remember his parents' faces, but beyond that, it was as if he had been left a clean slate.

It was discovered that Obito had in fact inherited some of the five-tailed demon's chakra from his mother, a fact no one could as of yet understand. Due to this special trait, he was very skilled as a shinobi. Having been under the control of the Akatsuki, he had been trained to be a stone cold warrior, reaching a level equal to that of a jonin. This was not at all surprising considering Kakashi had been elevated to jonin at around the same age. The one thing that the boy lacked, however, were social skills; to remedy this, Kakashi and Itsu decided to enroll the boy in the academy, where he could interact with children his own age. It was a process that the boy had had to get used to. After being enrolled for only a short time, he quickly shot up to the top of his class; chances were, he would graduate within the year, but at least then he'd be placed in a genin squad where he could make friends and quickly rise through the ranks of the village shinobi.

"Bring that in here." Itsu called out from behind the thin screen door that separated her from the room her husband, son and father stood, carrying in a very heavy new bed for Obito.

They had all moved back into their once warm and happy home, in hopes that soon there would be new joys and laughter shared within those walls. They had decided to move Obito to a larger room from the one that used to belong to him.

"Here, let me help." Itsu moved to assist the three men.

"It's okay, we've got it." Kakashi told her.

"Fine." She relented, before stepping back into main hall way, as they walked over to Obito's new room.

"Where do you want this?" Sasuke asked, as he entered the house, carrying a large box.

"Over in that room." Itsu pointed to a door on the left.

"Hey Itsu-chan, which way to the garden?" Naruto asked, as he carried in a large sack of soil which Itsu intended to use to replant her once beautiful garden.

"It's through that door" Itsu point to the right, "Sakura will tell you where to put that."

"Thanks." Naruto exclaimed, before walking out the door Itsu had directed him to.

"This is some party." A voice said from outside the front door.

Tsunade walked through the door, followed shortly after by Shizune.

"Kakashi had his team come in a help with the move." Itsu replied.

"Well that's good; at least it gets Naruto out of my hair, not to mention your father." Tsunade groaned.

"Don't worry; they'll be busy for a while." Itsu informed her. "But if I may ask, to what do I owe this honor?"

"I came to collect a debt, and to deliver some good news." Tsunade replied.

"Oh? What news?" Kakashi asked, as he and Jiraiya stepped into the room, followed shortly after by Obito.

"Jiraiya, you owe me 12,000 yen." Tsunade announced to the room. (A/N: um… about 100 dollars… well over 100 dollars, more like 101 dollars and 54 cents).

"WHAT?!" Jiraiya shouted questioningly, "I don't owe … oh" he stopped, realizing what the 12,000 yen meant. "YOU'RE PREGNANT?" Jiraiya looked at Itsu with wide eyes.

"WHAT?" Kakashi and Itsu shouted in unison.

"That was the second part of my visit here." Tsunade rubbed the back of her head embarrassed at how she had let it come out.

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A/N: Yeah… that was it… "AND THEY LIVED HAPPILY EVER AFTER." And now I get to go work on my first week reading assignments and live unhappily ever after for the next six months until I get my next break… if I live that long…

It's not over yet though… the next two chapters… which will be even shorter than this one… sorry but they're just snippets… alternate endings… well they're not really alternate since they're tacked on to this one…

Officially my "THE END" ends in this chapter… but the other two are just… for my own amusement… lol…

My apologies if you feel I left it as a cliffy… but it's not… it's just a nice light amusing moment to leave it at… :D


	25. Alternate Ending 1

**Disclaimer**: I don't own Naruto

**Chapter summary**: The first alternate ending

**Thanks for the reviews ;D **

Where the last chapter left off… add this small scene… call it my M. Night Shyamalan ending… lol…

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'_gasp'_

Kakashi shot straight up in bed. He had just had the most terrifying dream in his life. He looked over to his left and saw a mass of silver hair spread out on the pillow next to him.

"What's wrong?" a sweet voice whispered in the darkness.

"I had a bad dream." Kakashi replied.

"Don't worry about it. It was just a dream." Itsu pulled her husband down to rest on the bed again.

"It felt so real." He leaned into the pillow, moving closer towards her warmth.

"They always do." She replied, knowing all too well how real a dream could be, since she herself excelled at making illusions feel like reality.

"Maybe I shouldn't go on that mission tomorrow." Kakashi worriedly expressed.

"No, go." Itsu replied, "It'll be fine, it's only for a few days. Who knows, by then maybe Obi-chan will know how to swim."

"That's right, you're going to take him out for his first swimming lesson tomorrow." He said, sleep slowly taking him over.

"Yeah." She sleepily replied.

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A/N: dun dun dun… lol… I told you it'd be short… but just a little add on to the last chapter…

For anyone who didn't get it… basically it was all just a dream… but the twist is, Kakashi's waking up to the day before or day of the Uchiha massacre… it's amusing… but too "M. Night Shyamalan"-y… hence why it's merely an alternative ending and not the actual ending… still I couldn't help but include it in the "special features" hope you all at least got a nice laugh out of it… :P


	26. Alternate Ending 2

**Disclaimer**: I don't own Naruto

**Chapter summary**: The second alternate ending

**Thanks for the reviews ;D **

I couldn't not do this scene…

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"They look happy don't they?" Jiraiya stated as he and Tsunade sat in the finished garden watching Kakashi and Itsu playing with their two month old daughter.

Sasuke was helping Obito learn a new trick with his sharingan, while Naruto and Sakura were trying not to burn each other one the grill. It had started as a small gathering to celebrate Obito's promotion to jonin, and had somehow become a huge party. Genma and Gai had come, bringing along Gai's team. Kurenai and Asuma had also come, bringing their respective teams as well. Shizune and Anko, even the Hokage herself, had all shown up to congratulate Obito.

"They really do." Tsunade agreed.

"I always did like Kakashi." Jiraiya mused.

"Oh? I don't remember that." Tsunade replied with a knowing smirk.

----------**FLASHBACK**----------

"Keep away from my daughter!" Jiraiya shouted after the silver haired jonin, who had just dropped Itsu off at her father's house.

He had found the young couple saying goodnight on the door step and had immediately begun throwing the first thing his hand could reach, which in this case was his brand new Icha Icha Paradise novel.

----------**End of FLASHBACK**----------

"Well after that I thought he was a good kid." Jiraiya smirked, "after all, he can't be all bad if he likes my books."

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'_gasp'_

Kakashi shot straight up in bed. He had just had the weirdest dream in his life. As he glanced over to the clock on his night stand he realized it was long past time to head out to meet his students.

"Agh, remind me to never read before bed." He groaned.

Next to him on his small twin size bed was the brand new copy of Icha Icha Drama, the latest edition to Jiraiya's Icha Icha series.

"All I needed was an evil twin brother to complete the story." Kakashi grinned as he looked down at the blue book.

He quickly got dressed in his usual jonin attire and then put his famous mask on, before once more checking the time.

"Only half an hour late, I could stop by for some breakfast." He reasoned, "I wonder what I should use this time? Already did the one about the black cat, and being lost on the road of life… huh…" he pondered as he left to join his team at their training grounds. But not before a little stop over for breakfast, and then a few minutes at Konoha's memorial site.

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A/N: okay… that little Jiraya overprotective dad scene didn't pan out as well as I thought… but… at least I sort of got it out of my system… anyway… for those of you who didn't understand it… this alternate ending is, like the last one, none of the story actually happened, it was all just a dream of Kakashi's, only this time it was inspired by the latest edition in Jiraiya's Icha Icha series.

So that's it… thanks everyone whose read and reviewed this story...

Special thanks to babygurl1012 who reviewed practically every chapter, and helped me put some of my ideas in order… RyaneNight92 and snowecat, who gave really good suggestions… lovefatedestiny who was with us from the beginning… i love athrun who was, well.. consistent… lol… PhantomGirl94 who was very supportive…. And everyone else who reviewed or sent me messages… and everyone who added this story into their alerts and/or favorites… thanks so much… I'm glad you all enjoyed the story.


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